Around 3200 BC, Neolithic farmers in the Boyne Valley of Ireland built Newgrange, a huge round mound of earth and stone about 85 metres across, faced with white quartz and containing a 19-metre passage and a cruciform chamber. Over the entrance, a narrow opening called a roof-box lets the rising sun at the winter solstice shine along the passage and light up the chamber for about 17 minutes. It was built centuries before Stonehenge and the pyramids of Giza. Newgrange is decorated with spirals and other symbols carved in stone.
Before and after
- from c. 3,300 BCE to 2,600 BCEYamnaya culture
- from c. 3,300 BCE to 1982Origins of Qatna
- from c. 3,250 BCE to 400 CEEgyptian hieroglyphs
- from 4th millennium BCE to 1st millenniumAncient history
- c. 3,201 BCENewgrange passage tomb is built
- from c. 3,200 BCE to 1,050 BCECycladic civilization
- from c. 3,200 BCE to 3,060 BCENaqada III
- from c. 3,180 BCE to 2,500 BCEOrigins of Skara Brae
- from c. 3,150 BCE to 2,890 BCEFirst Dynasty of Egypt
More in Civilizations & archaeology
- from about 12,000 years ago to 7th millennium BCEConstruction of Göbekli Tepe
- from 10th millennium BCE to 3rd millennium BCENeolithic revolution
- from 10th millennium BCE to 3rd millennium BCENeolithic
- from 76th century BCE to 25th century BCEChalcolithic
- from 5th millennium BCE to 1st millennium BCEAncient Egypt
- from c. 3,300 BCE to 1,100 BCEMinoan civilization
The era
This moment belongs to the Human prehistory (300,000 years ago to 3,200 BCE), the human story before writing.