Slinging.org Forum - Slinging at Newgrange

Welcome, Guest. Please Login

Slinging.org Forum › General › General Slinging Discussion › Slinging at Newgrange

(Moderators: vetryan15, Chris, Rat Man, Kick, Curious Aardvark, joe_meadmaker, Morphy)

‹ Previous Topic | Next Topic ›

Pages: 1

Slinging at Newgrange (Read 2290 times)

bigkahuna

past-moderator

Offline

Posts: 3894
Delaware, USA
Gender: male

Slinging at Newgrange
Jan 7^th, 2007 at 9:28pm

Hi everybody. I just got back from Ireland where I visited the passage tomb at Newgrange. I must say it was a very Indianna Jones kind of place. I spoke with several of the staff there about the use of slings by the original paleolithic population and they all felt that slings were in use there. There just aren't any remains left. There were a number of round stones that nobody knew the purpose of, which could have been sling stones. The general feeling however seemed to be that what was used as ammo was whatever was at hand. Like a good Slinging.Org Member I had my sling with me for the occasion and cast several stones at the site, being perhaps the first slinger there in several thousand years.I will try to get some pictures up at some point. If you every go to Ireland this is a site not to be missed. It is one of the oldest man made structures in the world and predates the pyramids by a thousand years.

« Last Edit: Jan 8^th, 2007 at 9:11pm by bigkahuna »

Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.

IP Logged

magnumslinger Descens Offline I don't sling a thing if I ain't got my sling! Posts: 188 United Arab Emirates Gender:	Re: Slinging at Newgrange Reply #1 - Jan 8^th, 2007 at 9:54am That's really cool, Kahuna! It sounds like you were acting as a slinging ambassador on behalf of our noble pastime! That's always a good thing, to promote the good image and knowledge of slinging in the world.
Back to top	Slinging.org people are progressive preservers of pre-historic protective, pantry-packing, and post-paleolithic parabellum practices...and they're also generally REALLY COOL! Their bootlaces are their arsenal, and the world is their ammo dump! IP Logged

bigkahuna past-moderator Offline Posts: 3894 Delaware, USA Gender:	Re: Slinging at Newgrange Reply #2 - Jan 8^th, 2007 at 9:12pm I try.
Back to top	Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day. IP Logged

Curious Aardvark Forum Moderation Offline Taller than the average Dwarf Posts: 13965 Midlands England Gender:	Re: Slinging at Newgrange Reply #3 - Jan 9^th, 2007 at 6:31am [url]http://www.knowth.com/newgrange.htm[/url] Click on the big picture at the top of the page to get lots of other pics including aerial views. certainly looks interesting - wonder what mister tsarion makes of it :-)
Back to top	Do All things with Honour and Generosity: Regret Nothing, Envy None, Apologise Seldom and Bow your head to No One - works for me IP Logged

magnumslinger

Descens

Offline

I don't sling a thing
if I ain't got my sling!

Posts: 188
United Arab Emirates
Gender: male

Re: Slinging at Newgrange
Reply #4 - Jan 9^th, 2007 at 9:23am

Aardvaark, that web site is C-O-O-L! And a bit more serious than Mr. Tsarion's, wouldn't you say? Wink

Did you read the section entitled, "Ireland in Prehistory"?

It certainly looks like EXACTLY the type of place where slinging became the top way of defending the family farm! Those neolithic hill fortress communities may have been where the military concept of "the high ground" literally originated.

Slinging.org people are progressive preservers of pre-historic protective, pantry-packing, and post-paleolithic parabellum practices...and they're also generally REALLY COOL! Their bootlaces are their arsenal, and the world is their ammo dump!

IP Logged

Curious Aardvark

Forum Moderation

Offline

Taller than the average
Dwarf

Posts: 13965
Midlands England
Gender: male

Re: Slinging at Newgrange
Reply #5 - Jan 9^th, 2007 at 12:11pm

Looking at the pictures I can't help wondering how much is still the original structure. There is no way that the quartz and granite is entirely original, probably tells you on the website somewhere when it was last repaired.
But lets face it if there were lots of slingers in the area a lot of those rocks would have gone 'walkabout' :-)

But definitely an interesting building.

These kind of things always make me wonder what the ancients might have acheived if they'd applied the same sort of effort to the living as they did to the dead. Think about it for 20 years the majority of a tribes resources and manpower went into making this thing. You only need to look at some of the cities in china to see what can be done when this sort of effort is turned to more useful purpose.
The city wall in xian is - to my mind - one of the most amazing constructs on the planet.

If egypt hadn't built pyramidsfor the dead skyscrapers might have been invented 5'000 years ago.

And that folks is the thought for the day:- do the dead appreciate the effort expended on them ? :-)

Do All things with Honour and Generosity: Regret Nothing, Envy None, Apologise Seldom and Bow your head to No One - works for me

IP Logged

Willeke

Interfector Viris Spurii
Past Moderator

Offline

Give me some string and
I know what to do.

Posts: 2072
Netherlands
Gender: female

Re: Slinging at Newgrange
Reply #6 - Jan 9^th, 2007 at 12:27pm

I have been there, about 12 years ago, so my memory is a little spotty.

As far as I remember the hillocks were considered as holy or otherworldly by the Irish, 'do not go to that hilllock, the fairies will get you'.
So they stayed untouched till the English found it needed to have a lot of stones for roadwork and railroad work.
In the case of Newgrange the englishman told the local workforce to start digging on the side where the white and blackstones are.
When the locals found those they resisted digging a little harder than they had done before and the English crewchief had to call archeologists.
That is why this place got preserved.
But many other places in Ireland the standing stones and 'faires hills' have been demolised. I heard the number of at least half maybe even nine/tenth of the places that made it into the 19th century did not make it to the end of the 20th.

Willeke

"Never underestimate what a simple person can do with clever tools, nor what a clever person can do with simple tools." - Ian Fieggen - Writer of A booklet on lanyards, PM for info - Member IGKT, Netherlands
Bad spellers of the world: untie!

IP Logged

bigkahuna past-moderator Offline Posts: 3894 Delaware, USA Gender:	Re: Slinging at Newgrange Reply #7 - Jan 11^th, 2007 at 12:07am The stones at the site are in fact original and were there when excavation began in the 1960s. There are two other large passage tombs nearby. One at Knowth is almost as large as Newgrange.
Back to top	Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day. IP Logged

bigkahuna

past-moderator

Offline

Posts: 3894
Delaware, USA
Gender: male

Re: Slinging at Newgrange
Reply #8 - Jan 11^th, 2007 at 12:08am

Thanks for the pictures AArd. I don't have technical facilities for posting photos yet. I spoke with several of the staff at Newgrange. Their museum shows many examples of people armed with bows. I asked about slings and everyone I spoke to agreed that slings were in use at Newgrange but no archeological evidence has come to light yet. Ireland has been pretty slow in archeological excavation of its sites so maybe at some point we will get a sling or some obvious sling stones from one of the sites.

Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.

IP Logged

Pages: 1

Slinging.org Forum › General › General Slinging Discussion

‹ Previous Topic | Next Topic ›

(Moderators: vetryan15, Chris, Rat Man, Kick, Curious Aardvark, joe_meadmaker, Morphy)