Saturday, November 30, 2013
ARCHITECTURE IN ROCK ART – TIPIS – Part 1:
In their records left on the rocks by Native Americans of
their deeds and situations, we can look for clues to the environment that these
feats were performed in. One common feature of the environment in Great Plains
rock art is one or more residences, their tipis. In the tradition of Plains
Biographic Art much of the imagery in a composition is intended as information.
In this way a figure seen in relation to a group of tipis would represent a
specific person involved in some activity next to that tipi village.
Horseman in lower left, Anubis Cave, Cimarron
County, OK. Photo Peter Faris, 21 Sept. 1986.
My awareness of this came back in the 1980s on one of a
frequent number of trips down into southeastern Colorado. In the so-called
Anubis Cave in Cimarron County, Oklahoma, I saw a small equestrian figure on
horseback in front of the upside-down “V” of a tipi. It occurred to me at that
time that it placed a figure in a specific place, and thus at a specific time,
the time when he was there. In other words it was telling a story, a simple
story certainly, and one that did not provide me with much information, but a
story nevertheless. This is the basic premise of James Keyser in his statement
that the Biographic art of ledger books and painted robes can provide a lexicon
toward the interpretation of some rock art.
Las Animas County, CO. 1999.
Canyonlands, Las Animas County, CO. August, 1999.
In the Box Canyon Site in the Purgatoire river canyon in
southeastern Colorado a couple of panels illustrate combat in relation to
tipis. 5LA8464 was recorded in 1999 by a crew led by Jim Keyser and Mark
Mitchell. This is a large panel, faintly scratched into a large flat side of
the rock. This panel apparently records an attack upon a tipi village or family
encampment by a group of equestrian warriors on the right, whom I believe are
Pawnees by the details of their portrayal. The village or encampment being
attacked is represented by a tipi on the left side of the panel and would
probably have been Cheyenne or Arapahoe based upon the location. One defender
seen by the tipi has been struck by an arrow. A number of unridden horses
suggest that this combat bay have been in conjunction with a horse raid upon
this encampment.
Mark D. Mitchell, August 1999.
Another plains biographic rock art panel recorded by James
Keyser and Mark Mitchell is the Red Rock Ledge site in the Picketwire
Canyonlands, near the Box Canyon site. This smaller panel tells a story related
by Keyser in his subsequent published report. “The lightly-scratched petroglyphs at Red Rock Ledge compose a
Biographic scene showing a pedestrian bowman who has traveled from a tipi
village to engage and enemy represented by a crooked lance or coup stick.
Beginning at the right margin of the scene, and following the action to the
left, the composition consists of four major elements. At the far right is a
group of nine triangles with forked tops representing a camp of tipis. One
other incomplete figure probably represents a tenth tipi with one side no
longer visible. A series of seventeen more or less horizontal dashes and four
“C” shapes extends from the tipi camp toward the bowman. Based on comparisons
with other Biographic drawings in various media, the dashes represent human
footprints and the “C” shapes represent horse hoofprints. The third element,
the bowman, is a simply drawn, rectangular-body figure with a circle head. His
legs are shown with thighs, calves, and feet. The short diagonal lines that
extend outward from the front of each leg indicate fringed leggings. In his
right hand he carries a carefully drawn recurved bow that is shooting an arrow
with a large triangular point. The fourth element, located at the far left of
the scene, is a horizontally-oriented crook-neck coup stick, from which trail
four groups of paired streamers or feathers. Each group extends diagonally
downward to the left, and the four groups are spaced about equidistantly along
the shaft, with the last at the end of the crook.” (Keyser and Mitchell
2000:26-7)
In the well known horse pictograph/petroglyph from Picture
Canyon, in Baca County, Colorado, a number of very faint tipi shapes can be made out
with careful observation. Indeed, a group of four or five very faint
upside-down “V” shapes in the upper right corner of the photo represent a tipi
village, with at least two more at the top just left of center. These presumably represent the tipi village
that the horseman himself is associated with.
Numerous other examples of tipis portrayed in rock art can
be found in the literature. My point here is that in contrast to the common
assumption that “we can never know what rock art is saying” we can, in many
instances determine quite a bit about a rock art panel. I will show some other
examples and share some other thoughts in future columns.
REFERENCES
Keyser,
James D. and Mark D. Mitchell
2000 Red Rock Ledge: Plains
Biographic Rock Art in the Picketwire Canyonlands, Southeastern Colorado,
Southwestern Lore, Vol. 66, No. 2, Summer, 2000, p. 22-37.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment