2014 CERTIFIABLE ROCK ART PREVARICATION (C.R.A.P.) AWARD:

After deep research and careful consideration, the coveted 2014 C.R.A.P. award goes to www.examiner.com for seeing through the NASA cover-up and breaking the story of the discovery of rock art on Mars by our Martian rovers. The first example is the petroglyph of a human as recorded in a photograph taken by the Martian rover Curiosity.

Martian petroglyph of a human figure.
http://www.abovetopsecret.com

“A video posted to YouTube (as seen above) by UFOvni2012 shows the petroglyph and compares it to several of the Earth engravings and paintings, noting its stunning similarity to terrestrial carvings from ancient Egypt and other millennia-old civilizations. Highlighting the humanoid image and its bracketing lines (one below the stick-man, two above, and all parallel), the video suggests that the petroglyph may well be part of a stone column of some sort.” (www.examiner.com) The author of this story noted its stunning similarity to terrestrial carvings from ancient Egypt and other millennia-old civilizations. (www.examiner.com)

Martian petroglyph of an encircled Celtic Cross.

http://www.abovetopsecret.com

It is not just this one particular image either; “But Curiosity isn't alone in producing photos that capture remarkable images. Last week, NASA's Opportunity rover, an exploratory vehicle that has been on Mars now for a decade, photographed an image that looked every bit like an encircled Celtic or Irish cross.” (http://www.abovetopsecret.com)

Isn't that the darndest thing, that looks sort of like the sort of artifact I would expect if the end of Curiosity's rock drill had been forced into a layer of dust on that rock surface? Luckily I have the savants at www.abovetopsecret.com to straighten me out and help me interpret it correctly - thank you colleagues!

In light of the ongoing cover-up of the truth of UFOs and Ancient Aliens by our government it is very surprising that they let this slip through into the media. It makes me wonder how they could have kept so many other important secrets for so long.

NOTE: RockArtBlog wants to apologize to all the other wonderful sites that picked up the stories of the rock art on Mars and ran with it. You all deserve to be included in this 2014 C.R.A.P. award; I am sorry I just could not compile a full list of resources on this subject, but you have all truly earned a full share of C.R.A.P.

SOURCES:

http://www.abovetopsecret.com

http://www.examiner.com/article/photo-ancient-petroglyph-of-human-found-on-mars-rock-by-curiosity-rover-video.

MERRY CHRISTMAS 2014

From RockArtBlog

Rain tree, from Hicklin Springs,

5BN7, Bent County, Colorado.

THE DOHENY SCIENTIFIC EXPEDITION TO THE HAVA SUPAI CANYON, NORTHERN ARIZONA, OCTOBER AND NOVEMBER, 1924, PART 2 - THE FIGHTING MAN AND ELEPHANT:

Hubbard's photograph of a man supposedly fighting

with an elephant in Havasupai Canyon.

On June 21, 2014, I posted a column titled DINOSAURS IN ROCK ART – THE HAVASUPAI CANYON HADROSAUR. In this I expressed my disbelief in the claims of creationists that there are rock art examples of dinosaurs that prove that humans and dinosaurs coexisted and interacted. The example I discussed in that posting, the Havasupai Canyon so-called “hadrosaur” was first recorded by the Doheny expedition in October and November of 1924. On December 13, 2014, I posted a column about that expedition entitled THE DOHENY SCIENTIFIC EXPEDITION TO THE HAVA SUPAI CANYON, NORTHERN ARIZONA, OCTOBER AND NOVEMBER, 1924. In this I gave more detail about the background for the publication of the astonishing claims of Samuel Hubbard.

This expedition was led by Samuel Hubbard, Honorary Curator of Archaeology at the Oakland Museum, Oakland, California, who also wrote the report that I quote below:

“The Doheny Scientific Expedition to the Hava Supai Canyon in Northern Arizona, was organized for the express purpose of bringing before the scientific world, certain discoveries relating to prehistoric man made by the writer in three previous visits to this isolated region.” (p. 3)

“This canyon was first visited by the writer in November, 1894, and in February and March, 1895. Most of the matters of prehistoric interest described in this pamphlet, were observed at that time but their true significance was not fully recognized. Endeavors were made at various times to interest scientists in this discovery, but without avail. - - - -

The fact that some prehistoric man made a pictograph of a dinosaur on the walls of this canyon upsets completely all of our theories regarding the antiquity of man. Facts are stubborn and immutable thins. If theories do not square with the facts than the theories must change, the facts remain.

Samuel Hubbard, Director of the expedition.

Oakland, California,

January 26^th, 1925.” (p. 5)

Not content with just finding a petroglyph of a standing dinosaur on this expedition, Hubbard also discovered a petroglyph supposedly showing a man and an elephant fighting.

Hubbard's outline drawing of his

"elephant" in Havasupai Canyon
showing the "crab claw" feet of a
bighorn sheep portrayal.

“THE ELEPHANT PICTURE

On the same wall with the dinosaur pictograph, and about 15 feet from it, we found a pictograph which was evidently intended for an elephant, attacking a large man. The elephant is striking the man on top of his head with its trunk. The wavy line represents water into which the man has retreated up to his knees. Both arms are upraised and the fingers are visible on one hand. The other hand holds something, the form of which is too vague to be determined. Because there are no tusks indicated our surmise is that it is a cow elephant.

The remains of elephants are very common all over North America and they are found from Alaska to Mexico. Three species are represented: the mammoth, the mastodon and the imperial elephant (elephas imperator) of California. -

We think it probable that the pictograph is intended to represent the California variety. It is apparent that if the man and the elephant are drawn to the same scale, the man is taller than the elephant. In other words the man is more than 14 feet high.

This prehistoric tragedy is significant of several things. Did the men of that day have a taste for elephant meat and prey on the elephant calves? The attack of an infuriated cow elephant whose baby has been slain can be easily understood.” (p. 15)

Crabclaw bighorn portrayal, Petrified Forest

National Park, Photograph Peter Faris.

Grand Canyon desert bighorn sheep,

National Park Service Photo.

The first problem that I see with the claim that this picture shows a human fighting with an elephant is that the supposed elephant appears to have long, relatively thin legs ending in the cloven hoofs of what Campbell Grant called “crab-claw bighorn sheep.” There is no possible way that the feet on this creature could belong to an elephant. Then we have to look at that problematical trunk of the elephant. It extends on past the head of the man farther to the left. If the man is 14 feet tall as Hubbard contends, then this elephant has a trunk that is around 20 feet long! I submit that Occam's Razor points to the improbability of a race of 14 foot tall men fighting toe-to-toe with elephants in prehistoric North America.

I am afraid that I have to ascribe the identity of the animal next to the human figure to the desert bighorn sheep species (albeit a very crude portrayal of such), which still lives in and around the Grand Canyon and are commonly seen there, a food species of considerable importance to the ancient inhabitants of the American southwest. It is clear that Samuel Hubbard led a very unscientific expedition.

SOURCE:

Hubbard, Samuel

1925    The Doheny Scientific Expedition to the Hava Supai Canyon, Northern Arizona, October and November, 1924, Oakland Museum, Oakland, CA.

THE DOHENY SCIENTIFIC EXPEDITION TO THE HAVA SUPAI CANYON, NORTHERN ARIZONA, OCTOBER AND NOVEMBER, 1924:

The Grand Canyon petroglyph in question.

On June 21, 2014, I posted a column titled DINOSAURS IN ROCK ART – THE HAVASUPAI CANYON HADROSAUR. In this I expressed my disbelief in the claims of creationists that there are rock art examples of dinosaurs that prove that humans and dinosaurs coexisted and interacted. The example I discussed in that posting, the Havasupai Canyon so-called “hadrosaur” was first recorded by the Doheny expedition in October and November of 1924 and here is an abbreviated version of that account from Samuel Hubbard's account of that expedition.

“The Doheny Scientific Expedition to the Hava Supai Canyon in Northern Arizona, was organized for the express purpose of bringing before the scientific world, certain discoveries relating to prehistoric man made by the writer in three previous visits to this isolated region.” (Hubbard 1925:3)

“This canyon was first visited by the writer in November, 1894, and in February and March, 1895. Most of the matters of prehistoric interest described in this pamphlet, were observed at that time but their true significance was not fully recognized. Endeavors were made at various times to interest scientists in this discovery, but without avail. - - - -

Havasupai Canyon hadrosaur,

Doheny expedition, p. 10.

Hubbard's conception of what the petroglyph

represents. Doheny expedition, p. 11.

The fact that some prehistoric man made a pictograph of a dinosaur on the walls of this canyon upsets completely all of our theories regarding the antiquity of man. Facts are stubborn and immutable thins. If theories do not square with the facts than the theories must change, the facts remain.

Samuel Hubbard, Director of the expedition.

Oakland, California,

January 26^th, 1925.” (Hubbard 1925:5)

                   

Hubbard's map. Doheny Expedition, p. 4.

“THE DINOSAUR PICTOGRAPH

The “Tobocobe Trail” after leaving the “Warehouse” at the Hill Top, makes its way for about six miles down Lee Canyon, a tributary canyon to the main canyon of the Supai. Just at the junction of these two canyons are the most important wall pictures so far discovered. –

The accompanying halftone, taken from a photograph made by Robert L. Carson of San Gabriel, California, gives a better idea of the figure than any description can possibly attempt to do. The fact that the animal is upright and balanced on its tail would seem to indicate that the prehistoric artist must have seen it alive.” (Hubbard 1925:7)

“That dinosaurs were in the vicinity, is proved by the tracks we discovered, which were identified by Mr. Gilmore as belonging to one of the carnivorous dinosaurs. These tracks were in the “Painted Desert” not over 100 miles from the picture.

The dimensions of the figure are as follows: Total height, 11.2 inches; greatest width, 7 inches; length of leg, 3.8 inches; length of body, 3.9 inches; width of body, 3 inches; length of neck to top of curve, 3.5 inches; length of tail (approximately) 9.1 inches, length of neck (approximately) 5.1 inches.

About a year ago a photograph of the “dinosaur” was shown to a scientist of national repute, who was then specializing in dinosaurs. He said, “It is not a dinosaur, it is impossible, because we know that dinosaurs were extinct 12 million years before man appeared on earth.” (Hubbard 1925: 9)

 Edmontosaurus (an early hadrosaur), by 

Mineo Shiraishi. museumvictoria.com

Diplodocus, wikipedia.org

In my previous posting of June 21, 2014, titled DINOSAURS IN ROCK ART – THE HAVASUPAI CANYON HADROSAUR, I pointed out that, while this petroglyph fit what was thought about dinosaurs at the time we now know that the figure is completely inaccurate according to today’s scientific knowledge. Far from being the limp nebbish shown, standing on his hind legs with his tail dragging on the ground behind it, modern paleontologists see the hadrosaur as running bipedaly with his tail straight out behind, and relatively rigid. So, while the image might have made sense as a dinosaur in 1925, it no longer does. The same goes for the tail of the diplodocus that Hubbard equates the petroglyph with. It stuck out straight and relatively rigid, and while it would have been able to swing from side to side it probably rarely dragged on the ground at all. The designation of this petroglyph as a picture of a dinosaur must be rejected on the basis of our current scientific knowledge. So sorry creationists, it just isn’t true.

SOURCE:

Hubbard, Samuel

1925    The Doheny Scientific Expedition to the Hava Supai Canyon, Northern Arizona, October and November, 1924, Oakland Museum, Oakland, CA.

Wikipedia

SPEECH SCROLLS IN ROCK ART?

Chaco Canyon, trail to Penasco Blanco, San Juan county,

New Mexico. Photograph Peter Faris, May 1994. 

A familiar convention in Mesoamerican art is the speech scroll, a curved line or shape in front of the mouth used to indicate that the possessor is speaking. We do know that the rock art creating peoples of Mesoamerica, including Aztec, Maya, and Zapotec, all had symbols to represent speech or sound. These we generically lump together under the title “speech scrolls”. Examples exist in stone sculpture, on painted pottery, and in the few remaining books that survived the Spanish destruction, the codexes. We also know that these peoples had influence on the cultures and rock art of the American southwest. With this in mind I have kept an eye out for the general shape of a Mesoamerican speech scroll in rock art.

Aztec god Xochipilli, p.4, Archaeoacoustics

 Graeme and Lawson, 2006.

Aztec Codex Boturini, Fig. 11, p. 39, The Road To

Aztlan, Fields and Zamudio-Taylor, 2001. 

The Mesoamerican speech scroll was a curved line or scroll found issuing from the mouth, or in the general area of the mouth. My assumption is that a speech scroll connected to the mouth would represent a sound being made (speaking) where a speech scroll that is not connected to the mouth would represent a sound that had been made (previous speaking), but this might just be over thinking the problem. They could, in fact, just be two variations of exactly the same thing, a generic vocalization.

The petroglyphs at the top of this posting are to be found in Chaco Canyon, New Mexico, and bear an uncanny resemblance to many examples of the Mesoamerican speech scroll. Do they actually represent speech? I do not know, and we probably cannot know.  Indeed, without a figure in the picture to represent a speaker I must assume that it is unlikely that this was actually intended as a speech scroll. We do, however, know that there were contacts between the people of Chaco Canyon and Mesoamerican civilizations so there is the possibility that some of the imagery also made it to New Mexico. In any case it is fun to speculate.

Figure with speech scroll, carved
Mayan stela, from pu5h.info.

Mayan pottery cups with Camazotz, the bat god.

I have included some examples of Mesoamerican speech scrolls above for comparison, and below I have also included a European example of the same thing.

Figure with banderole (speech scroll),

Bernhard Strigel, 1506, Wikipedia.

As a side note, this phenomenon is also represented in our European art history as is explained in this comment from Wikipedia. “A speech scroll, also called a banderole or phylactery in art history, is an illustrative device denoting speech, song, or, in rarer cases, other types of sound. Developed independently on two continents, the device was in use by European painters during the Medieval and Renaissance periods as well as by artists within Mesoamerican cultures from as early as 650 BC until after the 16th century Spanish conquest. While European speech scrolls were drawn as if they were an actual unfurled scroll, Mesoamerican speech scrolls are merely scroll-shaped, looking much like a question mark.” (Wikipedia)

SOURCES:

Fields, Virginia M., and Victor Zamudio-Taylor,

2001    Aztlan: Destination and Point of Departure, pages 38 – 77, The Road To Aztlan: Art From A Mythic Homeland, edited by Fields, Virginia M., and Victor Zamudio-Taylor,

Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles.

Scarre, Chris and Graeme Lawson, editors

2006    Archaeoacoustics, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Cambridge.

Wikipedia