Brú na Bóinne: Newgrange and Knowth

The bend of the Boyne holds at least ninety monuments — passage tombs, burial mounds, standing stones and enclosures — and has been a World Heritage Site since 1993. The passage tombs were built from about 3300 BC; Newgrange, from around 3100 BC, is older than Stonehenge and the Egyptian pyramids, faced with white quartz and ringed by carved kerbstones, and at the winter solstice the rising sun shines through a roofbox and floods its chamber. Knowth, a little older, has two passages and 17 smaller tombs around it, and the largest assemblage of megalithic art in Europe. There is no direct access: visitors go by shuttle bus from the Brú na Bóinne visitor centre, on guided tours only.