Pentre Ifan is one of the most striking and well-visited Neolithic monuments in Wales.
The monument itself is impressive, but the views out to sea and of the nearby rock outcrops of Carneddau Meibion Owen, make this a must-see archaeological site. Pentre Ifan unsurprisingly continues to feature heavily in interpretations and reinterpretations of the Neolithic in western Britain.
Recently, Cadw launched a CGI reconstruction of how the burial chamber might have originally looked like in the early Neolithic.
To understand the site we rely on the excavations of Professor Grimes. The facade was never a portal for living people, but perhaps an entrance into the afterlife (or place through which beings from the otherworld can enter this one…). Originally, the uprights would have been enclosed within a trapezoidal cairn. Yet there remains much that is poorly understood about this monument and its immediate environs.
Archaeodeath Views
This site certainly deserves archaeodeath attention and it most certainly requires lots of photographs to communicate the striking experience of visiting this monument. Beyond that, I have three points from an archaeodeath perspective:
First, it is notable that this is again a site so meddled with that, had their been mortuary deposits in and around the chamber, none have survived. Again, this begs the question is absence of evidence the evidence of absence? Was a mortuary dimension the primary one? Was burial merely one of many uses for these monuments? Or was the disposal and commemoration of the dead the key dimension but simply difficult to discern because of subsequent reuse and disturbance? Might another observation and question be added: might the relationship between relatively ephemeral deposits of human bodies (cremated or unburned) and the monumental architecture provide the pivot around which we understand the roles of dolmens in the Neolithic? While we should be naturally suspicious of regarding these as ‘burial monuments’, I think we can go too far in dismissing the mortuary dimension of these monuments.
Second, what of the biography of this monument? Was it really a one- or two-phase construction and what of its ‘afterlife’ down the centuries? Unfortunately, while Cadw have tackled how it once looked, they haven’t really tackled how its appearance evolved through time…
Third, there is the usual old-fashioned Cadw sign and newer heritage board. At Neolithic monuments, I always show interest in whether the sites attract modern ritual activity. Whether this happens or not at Pentre Ifan, when I visited there were no signs of modern depositional activity. However, there was a lost infant’s shoe placed on the stone by the heritage board. I presume this was simply a lost item of footwear rather than a memorial offering to a lost child; then again, how would I know either way?
Archaeo𝔡𝔢𝔞𝔱𝔥 
I have always been struck at how early med and later populations in Ireland reimagined such monuments. Generally as ‘druid’ tables, or monumental ‘beds’ for mythical figures. Given the basic platform morphology, have always wondered why potential prehistoric excarnation rarely enters modern discussion. We know it was practiced at various times. Imagine the visibility of such a process would have been important ritual ingredient of such places, especially if it was just the first stage of eventual committal inside.
Hi Vox!
I am working on a reinterpretation of the early medieval perception of Wayland’s Smithy – as you are aware – and this relates in some way.
Yes, I totally agree, although I remain unclear regarding whether Neolithic scholars actually regard monument-based excarnation as what was going on – as opposed to fleshed burial and later re-opening/manipulation of decomposing/decomposed bodies within the chambers. Or indeed, whether cremation was a primary or secondary rite at these sites. I humbly defer to Neolithic archaeologists on this point.
Regarding early medieval perceptions; interested in the ‘bed’ association. But in Wales, ‘bedd’ would be the common term for ‘grave’ – or at least the interplay was being made here between place of sleep/rest and place of burial. Might this be pertinent in the Irish context at all?
I think, very pertinent, yes. The same here. When I said ‘bed’ I was translating of course. In Irish, it would be ‘leaba’. A lot of mega tombs, portal and others, are recorded on 1st OS maps as ‘Leaba Diaurmud & Grainne’ i.e. their bed – an imagining of them as temporary sleeping places for mythical lovers on the run. How far back this might go is hard to gauge, naturally, but its interesting when you excavate the etymology.
In Old Irish, leaba = ‘lepaid’, which carries usages like ‘harbourage, house-room’ as well as ‘bed, cubicle, sleeping-apartment’. Then of course, you have ‘leacht’, ‘grave, tomb, sepulchral monument, resting place’ coming from Latin ‘lectulo’, ‘Bed,Couch’. There is a very common overlap between ‘leaba’ and ‘leacht’ as ‘saints beds’ in early med too – mixture of stone graves/outside alters and pilgrim stations.
How much early med Irish differentiated between different prehistoric tomb types is also hard to gauge. There is a lot of usage of generic tĂşama (Latin: Tumulus) applied to a variety of sites. Barrow/Mounds generally depicted as ‘ferta’. Ive always thought it interesting that Passage Tombs (like Knowth) are called ‘caves’ in early sources (Ăşam; also ‘den, lair, a fox´s earth). Souterrain chambers/passages were also called the same up to quite recently. Interesting link with tuma/tumulus and cognitive understanding as places/compartments going ‘into the earth’, so to speak.
Will DM you something interesting for Weyland.
Forgot to say, re: Portals: interesting that when we eventually have recorded words/lore, its things like beds/tables/compartments etc…ie the early med people do not seem to have seen them any differently than we do, which may have implications as to whether they were ever covered up that much. If they were, then they seem to have been denuded in deep prehistory, with no sign that early med imaginations ever thought of them as such. This is despite having ample examples in their landscape of degrading cairns/passage tombs/cists all around them.
Reblogged this on sideshowtog.