Rock art recording

In light of global trends in human population growth and urbanization, burgeoning cultural heritage tourism industries, and climate change, cultural heritage places in nearly every corner of the world are significantly threatened, and will remain so into the foreseeable future. Rock art sites are some of the most imperiled, with their exposed contexts posing unique challenges to conservation. Consequently, effective management of publically accessible rock art sites necessitates a sustainable approach that weighs visitation in regard to cultural significance and site stability. This essay integrates rock art stability and sustainability assessment methodologies at the Painted Rock Petroglyph Site in southwestern Arizona. The study specifically applies the Rock Art Stability Index (RASI) to evaluate the natural and anthropogenic weathering forces impacting the site, and the Heritage Asset Sensitivity Gauge (HASG) to assess site sustainability under existing management practices in relation to current and forecasted rates of visitation. A spatial analysis of aggregated RASI data shows that visitor foot traffic has had some of the most profound impacts to the petroglyphs. Unrestricted access to the site area is also highly correlated with the presence and location of vandalism and graffiti, and visitor-related trampling has adversely affected the site’s surface artifact assemblage. Application of the HASG projects that, while existing management practices are fairly sustainable, they become less so under forecasted increases in visitation. Further, the HASG appraises the site’s cultural significance as outweighing its market appeal, indicating management efforts should prioritize conservation over tourism-related development.

El arte rupestre de La Tunita (Sierra de Ancasti, Provincia de Catamarca, Noroeste Argentino) sobresale en el contexto regional por su simbolismo, colorido, dimensiones y abundancia. La remembranza de un pasado conflictivo adquiere una gran visibilidad en La Tunita, parece haber una irrupción de la memoria, un uso político-ideológico de la misma en un particular momento del Período Medio (Siglos IV-X d.C.). Las pinturas más destacadas guardan relación con un repertorio iconográfico de raigambre ancestral asignable a la Cultura de la Aguada, denotando una forma de pensar con gran contenido mítico. Estas imágenes debieron participar de la construcción de la memoria local en el marco de una trama simbólica compartida con otros pueblos que configuraron la geografía Aguada. La evidencia arqueológica sugiere que estos pueblos pudieron intentar defender su autonomía y su lugar en el marco de los conflictos y tensiones sociales. En este trabajo indagamos en la posibilidad de que las grandes pictografías de La Tunita hayan sido utilizadas para activar la memoria y potenciar la identidad local, permitiendo reforzar una ideología místico-guerrera que intercepta el mundo real con el sobrenatural.

Oppe på høyfjellet  på Skurdalsporten i Meråker ligger tre bergflater som er oversådd med korsfigurer. De første korsfigurene ble oppdaget  på 1980-tallet, og ble da antatt å være spor etter pilegrimstrafikk gjennom området i middelalderen. Så langt har man funnet greske kors, latinske kors/t-kors, patrialkalkors/erkebispekors og Andreaskors her, men siden feltene i dag er overvokst med skorpelav, kan det finnes enda flere uregistrerte korsformer her.

Pilegrimsleden fra Skurdalsporten til Nidaros har i motsetning til leden fra Gauldalen og over Vassfjellet  ingen nærliggende arkeologiske funn som kan knytte lokaliteten til pilegrimstrafikken. Trekker vi imidlertid linjene østover til det norrländske landskapet finnes mange bevis på pilegrimstrafikkens eksistens og olavskultens stilling. Det at leden ble lagt gjennom dette landskapet, kan oppfattes som et politisk styrt forsøk på å skape et tyngdepunkt i Norden gjennom innføring av skatt til Nidaros også i Mellan-Norrland.  Gjennom Norges innføring av lover som skulle verne om pilegrimene, og opprettelsen av overnattingssteder, ser vi det samme bildet (Ekroll in prep.).

Korset var pilegrimenes mektigste symbol. Ved å etterlate seg et merke i form av et innrisset kors eller en korsfigur kunne man på en enkel måte kommunisere for omverdenen at man var på pilegrimsreise. Å merke landskapet med kors kan oppfattes som en ritualisering eller kristning av stedet, der man sikret seg mot «ukristne» makter, spesielt i utmarka.

The discovery of petroglyph sites in the Blue Tier mountains of north-eastern Tasmania is reported, which raises two specific issues. The occurrence of aligned cupules is identified as a distinctive characteristic of Tasmanian rock art, and evidence for ritual use of mountain peaks is recognised for the first time in Australia. Dating evidence presented suggests that the Blue Tier sites were used in the second half of the Holocene, and cupules are identified as the most common rock art motif of Tasmania. Also briefly raised are the implications of the ‘mountain sanctuaries’ reported here to the interpretation of Tasmanian ethnography and cosmology.

Cupules have been subjected to interpretation attempts for as long as they have been investigated, and thousands of such attempts have been recorded over the past two centuries. Most of them were presented without any credible supporting evidence and are essentially ethnocentric constructs arrived at by unsophisticated contemplation. They are devoid of any cultural or taphonomic considerations, knowledge of antiquity or technological appreciation, and they are not susceptible to refutation attempts; hence they are not scientifically relevant. Only a minute number of sound ethnographic interpretations are available, and they are always site-specific or culture-specific; therefore no form of generic explanation for cupules can be offered. Such form of interpretation can only be attempted after a massive improvement in the currently very inadequate database we posses of cupules, much of which is distorted by futile interpretation endeavours.

Toro Muerto (valle del río Majes, Arequipa-Perú), es uno de los sitios arqueológicos más grandes del mundo y con mayor cantidad de expresiones petrográficas: en un área de 10 km2 se han registrado 2.584 bloques de rocas grabadas con representaciones geométricas, zoomórficas y antropomórficas. En el 2017, al realizarse las prospecciones de acuerdo con el Proyecto de Investigación Arqueológica Toro Muerto (PIA-TM), en el extremo norte del sitio, se halló una colina con 92 petroglifos aun no estudiados (Sector X). En el 2018, se realizó un registro integral y preciso de todo el yacimiento: cada roca cuenta con fichas, fotografías calibradas, dibujos y algunos modelos 3D de rocas. Asimismo, se realizaron levantamientos geodésicos, fotogrametría del terreno, ortofotos, tecnomorfología y modelo 3D del sector y también excavaciones. El presente artículo trata sobre el estudio y la virtualización integral del patrimonio cultural rupestre del referido sector.

Stretching back in time, the Hill of Tara has been the spiritual heart of Ireland, yet little is known about the site other than what has been gleaned from the ancient manuscripts, which tell us nothing about how it appeared during the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age. Although the excavations in the 1950’s of Ráith na Senad and Duma na nGiall, by Professor Sean P. O’Riordain and Professor Ruaidhri de Valera, have given us a glimpse into that period of history, they merely scratched the surface. It is therefore the purpose of this paper to examine an ‘historical record’ that has been overlooked ever since its discovery sixty years ago… one that is quite literally carved in stone.

Although a complex and primarily zoomorphic iconography developed in Upper Egyptian rock art during the Predynastic Period, often making allusion to humans, anthropomorphs are uncommon in the corpus. The imagery that decorates the rocks of the Upper Egyptian desert could also appear as body decoration — tattooing and/or body painting — on images of female ritualists who oversaw the conversion of the animals of the desert hunt into the meat offerings of the temples of the Nilotic world. The imagery could both socialize the desert, and turn the body of a hunter or ritualist into a type of landscape. Later Egyptian texts reveal that the surface of the rock and the skin of a human could both express an inner, latent imagery. The absent human in the imagery of Predynastic Upper Egyptian rock art is supplied by the viewer of the imagery, or the ritualist who wears it. The human body of the viewer mediates the reflectivity of rock and skin.

El objetivo principal de este estudio reside en la aplicación de técnicas de análisis digital de imagen para documentar de manera integral la pintura rupestre. Parece, pues, conveniente comenzar este trabajo trazando un breve panorama del arte rupestre que existe en nuestro entorno más cercano, la Península Ibérica, para ayudar a definir nuestro campo de actuación. Por otra parte, puesto que el arte rupestre no se encuentra aislado en el espacio, ajeno a las influencias del entorno sino, por el contrario, constituyendo parte indisoluble de sistemas naturales de naturaleza dinámica, consideramos apropiado hacer una breve revisión de las características de estos sistemas y sus flujos energéticos para comprender la naturaleza de los factores de deterioro que pueden afectar a la conservación de las pinturas rupestres. A partir de estas reflexiones encontraremos el camino para definir el concepto de documentación integral del arte rupestre, un concepto que resulta clave en este trabajo toda vez que pretende desarrollar e implementar técnicas que permitan minimizar el tiempo y el impacto de la documentación de la pintura rupestre.

Newberry Cave, located in San Bernardino County, California, is home to the only known green pictographs in the central and eastern Mojave Desert.  These archaic pictographs mimic the only split twig figurines known from California and provide a unique pairing of rock art images with such figures.  The rich artifact assemblage adds context to the split twig figurine tradition.  Pigment stones found in Newberry Cave match the paint on the walls and some artifacts.  New examination under a scanning electron microscope, obsidian hydration tests, and a full recording of the rock art yields more detailed information on a truly unique place.

El principal objetivo de la presente disertación es intentar comprender los mecanismos conceptuales que llevaron a los grupos humanos a señalar determinados lugares a través de pinturas rupestres esquemáticas, durante el Neolítico y el Calcolítico. Se analizaron diversos núcleos de abrigos con pinturas rupestres, ubicados en el centro del territorio portugués: Abrigo do Ribeiro das Casas (Almeida), Abrigo de Segura (Idanha-a-Nova), Abrigos do Pego da Rainha (Mação), Abrigo do Lapedo (Leiria), Lapa dos Coelhos (Torres Novas), Lapa dos Louções (Arronches), Igreja dos Mouros (Arronches) y Abrigo Pinho Monteiro (Arronches).
El análisis de las características formales y técnicas de ejecución (incluyendo un abordaje arqueométrico aplicado a los pigmentos) ha permitido tejer consideraciones sobre la metodología utilizada en el momento de la realización de las pinturas. El estudio de las características de implantación de cada yacimiento posibilitó el establecimiento de cuatro patrones de ubicación de los abrigos pintados los cuales, a la par de la descripción sistemática de los motivos representados y su interconexión, han permitido crear una periodización, con  dos periodos distintos. En la primera fase, tenemos la iconografía de transición de las comunidades recolectoras hacia los primeros grupos agro-pastoriles, que exhibe aun pormenores de la imaginética paleolítica, apareciendo zoomorfos de grandes dimensiones y antropomorfos con características formales, correspondiendo, pues, a un “arte esquemático semi-naturalista”. Con  la consolidación del sistema agro-pastoril, la sedentarización y la complejificación económico-social los esquemas de antropización del paisaje y del universo conceptual colectivo se alteran profundamente, originando representaciones reducidas a sus elementos mas básicos, que se vuelven totalmente esquemáticas. Se produce una transmutación de los motivos en ideogramas, dando origen al segundo periodo, titulado “arte esquemático ideográfico”, cuyo marco cronológico abarca el periodo comprendido entre el Neolítico final y el inicio de la Edad de Bronce.
En el contexto peninsular, el arte esquemático deberá, pues, ser visto como un proceso muy heterogéneo, resultante de las propias dinámicas de las comunidades que lo han producido y que, como tal, solamente puede ser analizado en un ámbito regional alargado. Por estos motivos, la periodización establecida deberá, por ahora, aplicarse solamente al área geográfica estudiada en la presente disertación.

ʻPetroglyphs: The Bend of the Boyneʼ predominately explored the hypothesis that many of the panels of artwork found within the Boyne Ensemble, are ʻmapsʼ of the site as it existed during the Neolithic. While that hypothesis was applied to a number of other sites in Ireland, the UK and France, any hypothesis must undergo repeated testing. As such, this paper, which for all intents and purposes is an addendum to ʻPetroglyphs: The Bend of the Boyneʼ, addresses a number of points and observations not previously covered, as well as a number of additional sites, both in Ireland and the UK.

The EAST AFRICA and HORN OF AFRICA Rock Art Bibliography is extracted from the Rock Art Studies Bibliographic Database version r31 and contains 228 citations covering the countries of: Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Djibuti, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Somalia.

At least since the advent of modern archaeology, archaeologists have proposed numerous interpretations of the petroglyphs found throughout Ireland and the UK, yet none have ever been tested, nor can they ever be tested, and therefore do not meet the criteria of a scientific hypothesis or theory. This paper explores the likelihood that many of the panels of petroglyphs decorating the orthostats and kerbstones at sites such as Knowth, Newgrange and Dowth, simply depict the monuments that were constructed during the Neolithic and Early Bronze Ages. The spatial distribution of the motifs on stones at Knowth, Newgrange and Dowth for example, were a way of drawing in the wider ritual landscape, creating for the community a way of connecting the physical landscape, with the realm of the dead.

Though many of the monuments within the Boyne Ensemble are still visible in the landscape, there are hundreds of sites where nothing can be seen, except for the panels that exhibit this enigmatic art, with hundreds more yet to be discovered. With the advances in geo-prospecting technology, and using the probable cartographic information on the panels, undiscovered sites and monuments beckon.

BRITISH ISLES Rock Art Bibliography is extracted from the Rock Art Studies Bibliographic Database verison r31 and contains 770 citations covering the countries of: England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland, Isle of Man, and Channel Islands.

The pipette is a rare rock art motif found across the North American Southwest but seldom depicted in other media. We address landscape and archaeological contexts, associated imagery, material correlates, and ethnography to provide an interpretative hypothesis that accounts for the motif’s widespread, cross-cultural use. We argue that pipettes represent a tiered cosmos and axis mundi, at times with portrayals of emergence and transcendence. The pipette’s compartmentalization signifies the conceptual metaphor ‘the cosmos is comprised of containers’, a concept embedded in Uto-Aztecan languages with Mesoamerican antecedents. The motif’s distribution across the North American Southwest demonstrates that it was a key religious symbol that accompanied the adoption of Mesoamerican-like religious beliefs and practices beginning in the eighth century or before. Prehistoric iconography – whether we understand it or not – references thought and ideas that were important enough to memorialize. Despite difficulties inherent to interpretation, archaeology would be remiss not to take advantage of the enduring iconological record. We demonstrate that careful, concentrated, and multidimensional approaches to understanding prehistoric symbolism can provide valuable and credible insight into cultures that otherwise could not speak for themselves.

This study combines detailed observations of the behaviour of swifts (family Apodidae) with the ethnography of southern African hunter-gatherers in order to investigate the symbolism of a painted motif of therianthropes (images that combine characteristics of human and non-human animal species) referred to here as 'swift-people'. The standardized appearance and widespread distribution of this motif presents a remarkable opportunity to investigate prehistoric hunter-gatherer beliefs in this part of the country. It appears that the painters created a unique class of being by linking the behaviour of swifts to hunter-gatherer rituals and practices.

Since we were children, we get used in leaving our marks on the walls, in various places, leaving as such represented our vision of real and imaginary worlds and creatures.
The stone elements have always been the most privileged places for recording messages and speeches that would last the passage of the ages.
We present as follows, a series of engravings - still unpublished for the most of them - from several eras, which illustrate the desire to mark the possession of territories and spaces (either due to their agricultural wealth or by the various riches present in the subsoil) or the eventual stone record of striking events for those who perhaps observed them or listened to their history by recording them into stone.

I. Antonio Bregante - los años de formación artística;
II. Datos laborales;
III. La documentación del arte rupestre (La documentación de arte rupestre en la primera mitad del siglo XX en España; Los primeros calcos de Antonio Bregante; Una nueva técnica de documentación);
IV. Una controversia (Cova del Tendo o La Moleta de Cartagena en Sant Carles de la Ràpita, Tarragona;
V. Exposiciones;
VI. Antonio Bregante como autor;
VIII. Conclusiones

The Idaho Rock Art Bibliography takes a comprehensive look at the literature concerned with rock art studies in the State of Idaho (USA) from the earliest reports through the present day. The data for this bibliography has been exported from the Rock Art Studies Bibliographic Database (https://musnaz.org/rock_art_studies_db/).

The Dona Ana Archaeological Society's Rock Art Recording Team (DAAC-RAC) is working on a project to relocate and update site information for rock art sites in Southern New Mexico on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) properties. The previous report for LA 4450 was complete and the site information was correct but since technology has improved, this submission is for adding photos, enhanced photos and a schematic with drawings.

Rjabchikov, Sergei V., 2022. The Mystery of the Dog in the Marquesan Rock Art has been Solved. Paper. 2 pages.

Abstract. Sergei V. Rjabchikov studies the drawing on a boulder, Nuku Hiva, the Marquesas Islands. As a result, the mixture of the Peruvian and Polynesian mythologies has been deciphered successfully.

The original was first delivered by Sergei V. Rjabchikov as the paper “The Mystery of the Dog in the Marquesan Rock Art has been Solved” on the scientific session of the Sergei Rjabchikov Foundation – Research Centre for Studies of Ancient Civilisations and Cultures in Moscow on July 4, 2022.

Keywords: Marquesas Islands, Easter Island, Rapanui, Rapa Nui, Polynesia, Quechua, Andean, Peruvian, rongorongo, script, writing, hieroglyphic script, folklore, mythology, Austronesian studies

The cultured discovery of Alpine engraved rocks, known all along by popular culture, first appeared in the literary field, and then in the academic and scientific ones. The earliest mentions refer to the Mt Bego complex, which was first cited in the manuscripts from the 15th to the 17th century, and in printed form in the first half of the 19th century (Foderé 1821, Gioffredo 1839). The descriptions are vague and fanciful, mostly due to the lack of interpretative tools rather than observational findings. Scientific research started in the second half of the 19th century when Matthew Moggridge published a brief report together with sketches of more than one hundred figures (Moggridge 1869). Some years later, Clugnet and Blanc presented more accurate tracings. They anticipated the two main interpretive branches, one related to pastoralism (Clugnet 1877), and the other to the worship of a malevolent mountain deity (Blanc 1878) and to the “sacred mountain theory”. It has to be underlined the awareness of the distribution of figures only over a certain petrography (Clugnet), and the evident presence of separate and individual engraving acts (Blanc). In 1879 appears the work of the French archaeologist Emile Rivière, specialist in Palaeolithic, who reproduced with great precision more than four hundred figures, only partly published. Rivière proposed the first typological classification by dividing the engraved figures into three groups, and launched comparativism, suggesting comparisons with Morocco and the Canary Islands; he didn’t recognize the halberd, and nor dagger, figures. With the literate Emmanuel Celesia (1886), who suggested a very unlikely Phoenician origin of the engravers, the first Italian scholar appeared. Thanks to the local surveyors Degiovanni and Bacchialoni, he was the first to publish 68 engraved Fontanalba figures. In 1901 the long Arturo Issel’s text was published; Issel didn’t carry out researches in the area in first person, but carefully examined what had already been published and based his paper on early Bicknell’s works. He ascribed some of the engraved artefacts to the Early Bronze Age and suggested that the authors were “people dedicated to agriculture and pastoralism”, who attributed great importance to engraved figures with a “religious or political” meaning.
Alongside the figurative strand, that of the cup-marks appeared in the same years, introduced in the alpine area by the Swiss archaeologists Fréderic Troyon (1854) and Ferdinand Keller (1870). Keller was inspired by the George Tate’s (1865) and Sir James Young Simpson's (1867) works, where the text was accompanied by accurate reproductions of cup-and-rings engraved rocks. In Italy the first publications of cup-marked stones are due to Giuseppe Piolti and Vincenzo Barelli (1880); they relate to the morainic amphitheatre of Rivoli and to the Val d’Intelvi. The research on non-figurative engravings was anticipated in the XVIII cent. by the studies on “rock-basons” – today considered to be of natural origin – published by the English antiquarians Borlase (1754) and Rooke (1782).
As regards to documentation and interpretation, the research began and was fully formed in the third of the last decade of the 19th century. It is likely that for both figurative and non-figurative branches there was a common sparkle favoured by George Tate’s work: Ferdinand Keller cites him directly, and like him also Matthew Moggridge was a member of the Geological Society of London, through which he was probably able to meet him or at least to know his work. All the various documentation techniques applied, such as sketches, paper reproductions – rubbings or squeezes – and tracings, were methods borrowed from antique dealers and epigraphers. The publication of complementary documentation, together with the attentive iconographic and necessary observational findings, have from the very beginning of the research constituted the essential characteristics of the path to be followed.

La scoperta colta delle rocce incise delle Alpi, da sempre note alla cultura popolare, si manifesta in ambito dapprima letterario, poi accademico e scientifico. Le prime citazioni sono per il complesso del Monte Bego, riportato in manoscritti dal XV al XVII secolo, e in pubblicazioni a stampa della prima metà del XIX secolo (Foderé 1821, Gioffredo 1839). Le descrizioni sono imprecise e fantasiose, più per la mancanza di strumenti interpretativi che per l'assenza di riscontri autoptici. Il percorso scientifico ha origine nella seconda metà dell’800, quando Matthew Moggridge pubblicò una breve relazione accompagnata dagli schizzi di oltre cento figure incise (Moggridge 1869). A seguire, Clugnet e Blanc presentarono riproduzioni più precise. Sono i precursori dei principali filoni interpretativi, il primo legato all'ambito pastorale (Clugnet 1877), il secondo alla devozione verso una divinità malevola delle cime (Blanc 1878) e alla teoria della montagna sacra. Da sottolineare la coscienza della distribuzione delle figure solo su determinati supporti rocciosi (Clugnet) e l'evidente presenza di atti incisori separati e individuali (Blanc). Segue l'archeologo paleoliticista francese Emile Rivière (1879), che riprodusse con grande precisione oltre quattrocento figure incise, pubblicate solo in parte. Avviò una prima classificazione tipologica, dividendo le figure in tre gruppi, e inaugurò il filone comparativistico, proponendo raffronti con il Marocco e con le Canarie, senza però riconoscere né le figure di alabarde né quelle di pugnali. Con il letterato Emanuele Celesia (1886), che suggerì una poco probabile origine fenicia degli autori delle incisioni, entrano in campo gli studiosi italiani. Grazie ai ricercatori locali Degiovanni e Bacchialoni, ebbe il merito di pubblicare per primo 68 figure incise di Fontanalba. Seguì nel 1901 il corposo scritto di Arturo Issel, il quale non svolse ricerche in prima persona nell'area, ma esaminò con attenzione quanto già pubblicato basandosi sui primi lavori di Bicknell. Attribuì una parte dei manufatti incisi alla prima età del bronzo e riconobbe negli autori "gente dedita all'agricoltura e alla pastorizia", che dava grande importanza alle figure incise, di significato "religioso o politico".
A fianco di quello figurativo, nacque negli stessi anni il filone delle rocce coppellate, inaugurato per la zona alpina dagli archeologi svizzeri Frédéric Troyon (1854) e Ferdinand Keller (1870), quest'ultimo ispirato dai lavori di George Tate (1865) e Sir James Young Simpson (1867), dove il testo è accompagnato da accurate illustrazioni di rocce a coppelle e cerchi concentrici. Per l'Italia le prime pubblicazioni, di Giuseppe Piolti e di Vincenzo Barelli (1880), riguardano rocce coppellate nell'anfiteatro morenico di Rivoli e della Val d’Intelvi. Le ricerche sulle incisioni non figurative ebbero un antecedente settecentesco con gli studi sui “catini litici”, oggi ritenuti di origine naturale, da parte degli antiquari inglesi Borlase (1754) e Rooke (1782).
Come documentazione e come interpretazione la ricerca nasce e si forma pienamente nel terzultimo decennio dell'Ottocento. Sia per il filone figurativo che per quello non figurativo è probabile una comune scintilla favorita dall'opera di George Tate: a lui si riferisce direttamente Ferdinand Keller, e come lui Matthew Moggridge è membro della Società Geologica di Londra, tramite la quale aveva probabilmente potuto incontrarlo o conoscerne l'opera. Già pienamente operative le varie tecniche di documentazione, schizzi, calchi cartacei – a sfregamento o a bassorilievo – e ricalchi, metodi mutuati dagli antiquari e dagli epigrafisti. La pubblicazione dei corredi di documentazione, unita all’attenzione per il reperto e alla necessità dell’esame autoptico, hanno costituito sin dai primi passi della ricerca i tratti irrinunciabili del sentiero da percorrere.

RE-THINKING ROCK ART: BIOGRAPHIES OF RESEARCH, NEW THEORETICAL EXPLORATIONS AND MULTIDISCIPLINARY APPROACHES (STANDARD PAPER)

Session Organisers: Joana Valdez-Tullett; Sofia Figueiredo Soares; Andreia Silva

Abstract: The nature of rock art’s representations, execution techniques, settings, poor understanding of chronology and lack of contexts or features akin to other types of archaeological remains, makes this a difficult subject to approach. Open to much speculation, it is mostly side-lined by mainstream archaeology. Despite its long research biography, rock art studies are typically developed within regional frameworks, raising issues regarding terminology, methodologies and theoretical backgrounds. The introduction of Landscape Archaeology in the 1990s, its new methodological and theoretical approaches, marked an important turning point in rock art research, highlighting the need to bring rock art into mainstream archaeology, given its social role in past societies. Recently, a new revolution in rock art studies began with the introduction of new digital recording methods and other computer techniques, as well as archaeometry and statistical studies, offering opportunities to re-think rock art, reconsider old questions, raising new possibilities of interrogation and further insights into its social and cultural roles. In this session we welcome papers from all chronologies and geographies about rock art’s research biographies; the potential and limitations of old and new approaches; how new approaches challenge old perspectives; the interplay between archaeology and ethnography in rock art studies; the role of digital technologies and what they bring to rock art studies beyond ‘pretty pictures’; the value of multidisciplinarity; the significance of new rock art finds to well established traditions; the role of archaeological theory in rock art studies; rock art’s social and cultural place in the past.

El Cacao: de los dioses para el mundo
América Malbrán Porto P.  9

Rituales de las láminas 15 a 17 del Códice Borgia:
¿Nacimiento del tlamacazqui?
Ofelia Márquez Huitzil P. 43           

Abrigo Rincón Mariano, un álbum de trabajo
Enrique Méndez Torres P. 115

Emprender la realización de un trabajo que tenga como objetivo la mejora o el desarrollo de protocolos de documentación de arte rupestre conlleva la asunción de ciertas posiciones previas que delimiten el concepto mismo de documentación. La primera de ellas se refiere a cuáles son los elementos que debemos documentar. Con respecto a esta materia, tradicionalmente, el registro de las manifestaciones artísticas parietales se ha enfocado de manera casi exclusiva a la obtención de imágenes de los motivos diseñados sobre las superficies soporte. Con este objetivo implícito se han desarrollado los métodos de documentación que reseñaremos a lo largo del Capítulo 2. Las superficies sobre las que se desarrolla este arte han pasado por lo general desapercibidas en los estudios, encontrándose en ocasiones algunas referencias, en muchos casos de tipo general, a su naturaleza litológica. El enfoque tradicional histórico-arqueológico ha permitido obtener mediante estos métodos informaciones muy útiles para establecer diversas hipótesis de naturaleza cronocultural. Sin embargo, los datos obtenidos a partir de estos métodos se han revelado como muy insuficientes cuando se trata de perseguir fines distintos, tales como los relativos a la conservación.

The evolution of “style” nomenclature for Southern California rock art dates back to the classic work of Steward (1929) and has been well described by Hedges (1973) in his review of the topic. The basis for the San Luis Rey Style was derived from the seminal work of True (1954) in his description of 15 Luiseño pictograph sites located in the heart of the San Luis Rey River basin in northern San Diego County, California. It is currently accepted that the extent of the San Luis Rey Style is not limited to the Luiseño culture. In order to examine the SLR Style definition's parameters more comprehensively, a total of 164 pictograph panels from 105 archaeological resource sites meeting the criteria of the San Luis Rey Style were sampled for this study. The subsequent analysis recommends a significant modification in the style definition to broaden its utility in reflecting the characteristics of the San Luis Rey Style.

The discovery and detention of a hidden pot hunter near the border of Southwest New Mexico has led to a fascinating hill top site. Several episodes of unusual petroglyph production, and rock art features were documented. Tracings of photographs from the site reveal interesting details that are sometimes missed with just photography. Having explored a large portion of the Jornada Mogollon regions of Southern New Mexico, Texas and part of Northern Mexico it is inspiring to find a new piece of the puzzle. This documentation is part of a long term project to update the Southern New Mexico rock art site information for the Bureau of Land Management and the state.

Preliminary report on the results from the Tregiffian project.
The Tregiffian project is the analysis and dating of the  archive from unpublished excavations at an entrance grave at Tregiffian in Penwith, Cornwall. The project involves analysis and publication of the very significant findings from the site and aims to establish a thorough chronological basis for the use of the entrance grave for burial, as well as analysing the burials and ceramics from the site and detailed photogrammetry of the stones.

L’opera raccoglie i risultati di più di dieci anni di lavoro a Campanine di Cimbergo, nella Riserva naturale delle incisioni rupestri di Ceto, Cimbergo e Paspardo, ad opera dell’equipe del Dipartimento Valcamonica del CCSP che propone il corpus completo delle istoriazioni, il catalogo delle rocce, un’accurata cartografia e una serie di interventi ragionati sulle tematiche più rappresentative. Campanine presenta una continuità istoriativa unica che copre un arco di tempo dal Neolitico (V mill. a.C.) alla piena età storica quando patiboli, segni cristiani, castelli e armati affiancano le più antiche figure preistoriche.