MUSIC AT ROCK ART SITES - THE MARSOULAS CONCH SHELL TRUMPET:

Engraved aurochs, Grotte de Marsoulas, France. Internet image, Public Domain.

            Marsoulis, Photo Heinrich Wendel,                              donsmaps.com.

I have previously posted a number of columns about rock art acoustics including some looking at the question of music at rock art sites (see the cloud index at the bottom of this site). On March 28,2010, I wrote about “Music At Rock Art Sites” speculating about mouth-bows and also mentioning Paleolithic flutes. On May 28, 2011, I wrote “The Flute-Playing Armadillo.” On October 6, 2018, I wrote about the “San Luis Valley Lithophones.” On July 20, 2019, I wrote “Rock Art Acoustics: Intentional, Accidental, or Irrelevant,” and on November 9, 2019, I wrote about “Music in Rock Art - Dong Son Drums In Indonesia.” (I do not, at this time, intend to revisit the subject of rock art and echoes which I have previously addressed extensively).

Conch shell trumpet, Grotte de Marsoulas, France. Photograph C. Fritz and G. Tosello.

Conch shell trumpet, Grotte de Marsoulas, France. Photograph Wikipedia, Public Domain.

Projection of the conch shell trumpet interior. Photograph sci-news.com.

In this article I am revisiting the theme of Music At Rock Art Sites with a conch shell trumpet that was found at the Grotte de Marsoulas, France. Discovered in the cave in 1931, and dated to 18000 BP, the “patterns painted on the inner-surface of the shell’s opening are done in the same style as those on the walls of the cave.” (Wikipedia-Marsoulas Cave)

Illustrating red dot patterns on the conch shell and on the cave walls. Photograph sci-news.com.

The reason that we can confidently relate the conch-shell trumpet to the rock art is that the wall of the cave is areas of red paint decoration of dot patterns done with human fingertips, and the inside of the bell of the shell also has red-painted fingerprint dots in it, seemingly a direct correlation. This particular shell is “a large specimen of C.(Charonia) Lampas (Linnaeus, 1758), a mollusk originating from the North-East Atlantic and the North Sea.” (Fritz et al. 2021)

A conch shell is made into a trumpet by breaking or grinding off the point or apex whorls (technically the protoconch) of the shell and blowing in it as into a trumpet mouthpiece if the hole is large enough, or inserting a hollow tube to use as a mouthpiece if the hole is smaller. It is not enough to just pass air out of the mouth, the lips are tightened so that there is a vibration between them. The sound reverberates within the shell and comes out the large opening.

“Discoverers of the conch shell at the cave’s entrance in 1931 thought it had been used as a shared drinking container. But microscopic and imaging examinations indicate that someone had cut off the shell’s narrow end to create a small opening, the scientists report February 10 in Science Advances.”  (Bower 2021)

Note that the “discoverers of the conch shell at the cave’s entrance in 1931 thought it had been used as a shared drinking container.” This would be right in line with early archaeological designations of anything not immediately understood as ritual or ceremonial, a “shared drinking container” would have been assumed to be used in rituals or ceremonies.

The musicality of the shell was tested by actually playing it. “The seashell was entrusted to a musicologist and horn player, specializing in wind instruments. The mouthpiece was protected to blow into the retouched extremity of the apex. To play the shell, the musician vibrated his lips in the manner necessary to play the trumpet or the trombone. The musician thus chooses the vibration frequency among the possible resonances of the air column via the muscular tension of the lips and the control of the air mass moving in the tube.

Several high-quality notes were produced, corresponding to the natural resonances of the conch shell. The lowest note is close to C and the two others are respectively close to a C-sharp and a D, equaling a halftone each time. During the experiments, the musician remarked that the apex in its current chipped form is not functional because it could injure the lips of the instrumentalist. He thinks that an intermediary tube was probably necessary to remedy this problem, and he proposed the hypothesis that a mouthpiece was present when it was used during the Magdalenian period.” (Fritz 2021)

The notes produced were in the order of 100 decibels measured one meter from the outlet of the shell. ”A cylindrical mouthpiece, possibly a hollow bird bone was inserted in the hole they suspect. Brownish traces of a resin or wax around the opening may have come from a glue for the mouthpiece.” (Bower 2021) Or indeed, a mouthpiece may have been shaped from the brown organic resin or wax. Modern brass instruments like trumpets, trombones, etc., possess a cup-shaped mouthpiece with an opening that is considerably larger than a bird bone would allow, but the brown organic residue around the hole at the apex suggests that some sort of mouthpiece had been fashioned.

Could this conch shell trumpet be used to play music during a ceremony at Marsoulas, possibly involving the caves painted and engraved imagery? Music - no, with the limited range of notes you cannot produce what I would call music.Remember, other than the human voice, there were relatively few ways to make actual music 18,000 years ago. But, one could produce impressive 100 decibel blasts of sound that would sound unnatural, and very impressive, to any audience, and might be considered to add an otherworldly air to the proceedings.  

NOTE: Some images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on these reports you should read the original reports at the sites listed below.

REFERENCES:

Bower, Bruce, 2021, Humans Made A Horn Out Of A Conch Shell About 18,000 Years Ago, February 10, 2021, www.sciencenews.org

Fritz, C., et al, 2021, First Record of the Sound Produced by the Oldest Upper Paleolithic Seashell Horn, February 10, 2021, https://advances.sciencemag.org

Wikipedia, Marsoulas Cave, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsoulas_Cave

NEW MAYAN CAVE PAINTINGS DISCOVERED IN YUCATAN:

 

New Mayan cave paintings discovered in the Yucatan.

An important discovery of Mayan paintings has been discovered in a cave 12 meters below ground in the eastern Yucatan by a team of archaeologists led by Sergio Grosjean Abimerhi.

“’It’s not the only cave with paintings in Yucatán but it is the most important because they have many elements: birds, mammals, a cross, geometric figures, human forms and among those that of a warrior as well as [prints made with] the front and back of hands,’ Grosjean said.” (Mexiconewsdaily)

   
     New Mayan cave paintings discovered                           in the Yucatan.

“The director of the Mexican Institute of Ecology, Science and Culture - a non-governmental organization that conducts environmental and cultural investigations - said that like cave paintings found in other parts of Yucatán, the newly discovered artwork ‘shows the high degree of evolution of the Mayan culture’. Grosjean explained that the colors of the paintings are derived from a wide range of natural pigments and other materials such as red earth, which is known in the local Mayan language as k’ankab. He added that neither the age of the paintings nor their exact significance has yet been determined but stressed ‘they’re the most important we have seen.’” (Mexiconewsdaily)

These painted images are noticeably different from much of the Mayan art we see with its formalized figures and inscriptions on steles and temples. This does not show as an organized scene of anything at all but a collection of symbols and images, probably done a little at a time over a longer period, and probably not by the same people who created the formal, public art of Mayan cities. Being in a cave, instead of on public display, would lead us to assume that they were produced for a much more private purpose, and for a much smaller audience.

      New Mayan cave paintings discovered in                           the Yucatan.

“In the coming days the team Grosjean leads will return to the cave with archeologists from the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) to carry out further identification work. ‘At the moment, we can’t reveal the exact location [of the cave] because undortunately in Yucatán, the looters and vandals are one step ahead of us,’ Grosjean said.” (Mexiconewsdaily)

Press reports do not mention any nearby Mayan cities or major sites so, in lieu of that knowledge, I will make some assumptions. I assume that these were not done by an important scribe or cleric from some kingdom, but by a local in a rural village or small town. He was probably acting equivalently to the scribes or clerics who produced major inscriptions and pictures, but for a rural or village audience instead of the court of an important city or capital. Without the formalized education or training of that scribe or cleric this creator was doing the best he could to produce the equivalent results on his own.

      New Mayan cave paintings discovered in                           the Yucatan.

Grosjean stated that “neither the age of the paintings nor their exact significance has yet been determined but stressed ‘they’re the most important we have seen.’” (Mexiconewsdaily) Well, that is demonstrably nonsense, but they do allow us, if the assumptions above are correct, to compare the tangible remains of rites or practices of difference levels of society, to compare the spiritual and intellectual life of the serfs with the royalty, so to speak.

NOTE: Some images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on this you should read the original report at the site listed below.

REFERENCES:

Staff,2018 Treasure Trove of Mayan Cave Paintings Discovered in Yucatan, July 25, 2018, https://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/cave-paintings-discovered-in-Yucatan/

REPTILES IN ROCK ART - THE HORNED LIZARD:

Regal horned Lizard. Wikipedia.

Like many people, I have always been fascinated by horned lizards. These endearing little guys seem to have something special about them. It has always been a pleasurable experience to run across one in the field. On August 14, 2010, I posted a column titled “Reptiles in Rock Art - A Horned Lizard Petroglyph Associated with a Solstice Sunset Alignment.” It detailed the discovery of a Solstice Sunset alignment site in South Mountain Park in Phoenix recorded by City of Phoenix archaeologist Todd Bostwick.

Horned lizard petroglyph at Winter solstice sunset in notch in Sierra Estrella mountains, from Lizard Monolith site. Photo Todd Bostwick.

“These rock art sites are identified as having been created by the Hohokam people. City of Phoenix archaeologist Todd Bostwick photographed a winter solstice sunset with the sun’s disk disappearing into a notch in the Sierra Estrella mountains to the west from one site. Remarkably, the viewing point at this site is a pointed boulder with a petroglyph of a thick-bodied horned lizard, facing downward, pecked on the face of it.” (Faris 2010)

“In his 2003 volume ‘Introduction to Horned Lizards of North America’, Wade Sherbrooke stated (p.149) that Hohokam art clearly depicted two species of horned lizard, the Short-horned lizard, and the Regal Horned lizard. Both of these species are found throughout the area inhabited by Hohokam peoples. The Latin name for the Regal Horned lizard is Phrynosoma solare, from the Latin solaris for ‘belonging to the sun.’ These heat-loving lizards retire from the evening cool and the cold of the night by retreating into underground burrows or burying themselves in sand. This may well be reflected in the downward facing position of the horned lizard in the picture of the Gila Vista site, implying the retreat of the lizard at sundown being observed through this alignment, and possibly identifying this image as the Regal Horned lizard.” (Faris 2010)

Three horned lizards, Petroglyph Park, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Photo Peter Faris, 1988.

     Closeup of horned lizard, Petroglyph            Park, Albuquerque, New Mexico.                  Photo Peter Faris, 1988.

Horned lizards are found in the mythologies of Native people’s of the American Southwest and the Plains. Both the Navajo and some of the Puebloan groups credit the horned lizard with helping the warrior twins kill off the giants that threatened the people’s existence on earth. He also often interacts with Coyote/Trickster and foils his plots. In a Hopi of these myths the horned lizard loans the hero his scaly skin for a helmet and armor enabling the hero to defeat the giants and monsters. (legendsofamerica.com)

Two horned lizards, Petroglyph Park, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Photo Peter Faris, 1988.

Riggs, Eugene, Hohokam Horned Toad, Image 19, slide 26A, Cochise College Library, Cochise College, Cochise, Arizona. Photo used by permission.

In the American southwest “humans and horned lizards have shared each other’s company for thousands of years. This relationship is recorded from Anasazi, Hohokam, Mogollon, and Mimbres indian cultures through their use of horned lizard images on pottery, petroglyphs, effigy bowls, figures and shells. Hopi, Navajo, Papago, Pima, Tarahumara and Zuni indian cultures portray horned lizards in their ceremonies and stories as symbols of strength. Piman people believe horned lizards can cure them of a staying sickness by appealing to the lizard’s strength and showing their respect to the animal. They formulate a cure by singing at a patient’s side songs describing the lizards and their behaviors. A horned lizard fetish may be placed on an afflicted person’s body during the songs.” (mstexan7)

And although it is somewhat unprofessional to anthropomorphize animals, I personally find horned lizards to be endowed with a lot of character and personality, perhaps because they seem so confident and relaxed when gently held (I realize that they may be petrified with fear, not relaxed, but that is the way they come across), and I suspect that the First American peoples did as well. That would be why we find them portrayed so often in rock art.

REFERENCES:

Faris, Peter, 2010, Reptiles in Rock Art - A Horned Lizard Petroglyph Associated with a Solstice Sunset Alignment, August 14, 2010, RockArtBlog, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com/2010/08/reptiles-in-rock-art-horned-lizard.html

https://www.legendsofamerica.com/az-legends/

http://mstexan7.tripod.com/id22.html

Riggs, Eugene, Hohokam Horned Toad, Image 19, slide 26A, Cochise College Library, Cochise College, Cochise, Arizona. Photo used by permission.

Bostwick, Todd W., 2002, Lanscape of the Spirits, Hohokam Rock Art at South Mountain Park, University of Arizona Press, Tucson.

Sherbrooke, Wade C., 2003, Introduction to Horned Lizards of North America, University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles.

A NEW CANDIDATE FOR THE OLDEST PICTOGRAPH - THE SULAWESI PIG:

45,500 year old pictograph of Sulawesi warty pig, Leang-Tedongnge Cave, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Internet photo, Public Domain.

Rock art researchers in Indonesia have announced the discovery of another candidate for the oldest representative rock art image, a picture of a Sulawesi Warty Pig found in a cave on the island of Sulawesi. “The warty pig from Leang Tedongnge cave dates to at least 45,500 years ago, making it the earliest known representational work of art in the world.” (Sci-News 2021)

“Leang Tedongnge cave: The cave is located at the foot of a limestone karst hill. - (The) rock art panel is located on a ledge toward the rear of the cave and features at least three large figurative paintings of pigs.” (Brumm 2021)

Sulawesi warty pig. Wikipedia.

“The Celebes warty pig (Sus celebensis), also called Sulawesi warty pig or Sulawesi pig, is a species in the pig genus (Sus) that lives on Sulawesi in Indonesia. It survives in most habitats and can live in altitudes of up to 2,500 m (8,000 ft). It has been domesticated and introduced to a number of other islands in Indonesia.

The Celebes warty pig is a medium-sized pig, and quite variable in size and appearance. It is the only pig species that has been domesticated apart from the wild boar; being semi-domesticated may have had an influence on the variability of its appearance. This pig has a head-and-body length of between 80 and 130 cm (30 and 50 in) and a long tail, with males generally being larger than the females. The back is rounded and the legs short. The colour is greyish-black, sometimes tinged with red or yellow on the flanks. There are three pairs of facial warts and a fringe of pale bristles on the snout and more bristles on the cheeks.” (Wikipedia)

     32,000 year old pictograph of Sulawesi warty pig, Leang-Balagajia 1 Cave, Sulawesi,           Indonesia. Photograph Sci-News.

Another large warty pig painting was found in the nearby cave of Leang Balagajia 1. “The result of Uranium-series dating provided respective minimum ages of 45,500 and 32,000 years for the Sulawesi warty pig images at Leang Tedongnge and Leang Balagajia 1.” (Sci-News 2021)

40,000-year-old Banteng, Borneo. Internet photo, Public Domain.

A previous candidate for oldest representative pictograph was from the island of Borneo. The island of Borneo is separated from Sulawesi by a little over 100 miles of water in the Makassar Strait. A limestone cave in eastern Borneo contained a red painted figure of a wild cow known as a Banteng (Bos javanicus) that was dated by uranium-thorium dating of a calcium carbonate layer at 40,000 ybp. This displaced another figure from Sulawesi as the oldest previously known representative pictograph. “Previously, the oldest known animal painting in the world was an approximately 35,400-year-old babirusa, or ‘pig-deer,’ on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi.” (Faris 2018)

Then we were notified of another find on Sulawesi in a cave named Liang Bulu’Sipong 4.

43,900 year old Anoa pictograph, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Photograph arstechnica.com.

“Across a 4.5 meter (14.8 foot) section of rock wall, 3 meters (9.8 feet) above the floor of a hard-to-reach upper chamber of a site called Liang Bulu’Sipong4, wild pigs and dwarf buffalo called anoa face off against a group of strangely tiny hunters in monochrome dark red. A dark red hand stencil adorns the left end of the mural, almost like an ancient artist’s signature.

Lieng Bulu’Sipong 4 is a living cave, still being reshaped by flowing water, and layers of rock have begun to grow over the painting in spots. The minerals that form those layers included small traces of uranium, which over time decays into thorium-230. Unlike the uranium, the thorium isn’t water-soluble and can only get into the rock via decay. By measuring the ratio of uranium-234  to thorium-230 in the rock, archaeologists can tell how recently the rock layer formed.

The deposits have been slowly growing over the hunting mural for at least 43,900 years, which means the painting itself my be even older than that.” (Smith 2019)

So, we have a range of painted animals from roughly the same region with a date spread of from 32,000 to 45,500 BP giving us new candidates for the oldest representative images now known. The discovery of this cluster of very old rock art from the same region in the last few years suggests that there is a vast amount left to learn about prehistory in southeast Asia and the islands which might require serious reappraisal of our preconceptions about prehistory and the rise of humanity.

NOTE: Some images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on these reports you should read the original reports at the sites listed below.

REFERENCES:

Brumm, Adam, et al., 2021 Oldest Cave Art Found in Sulawesi, 13 January 2021, Science Advances, Vol.7, No. 3, https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/7/3/eabd4648

Faris, Peter, 2018 Borneo Cave Art Claimed World’s Oldest Animal Image, 14 November, 2018, https://rockartblog.blogspot.com

Sci-News Staff, 2021 45,000-Year-Old Sulawesi Warty Pig Painting Found in Indonesian Cave, January 14, 2021, http://www.sci-news.com/archaeology/sulawesi-warty-pig-paintings-09250.html

Smith, Kiona N., 2019 A 43,000-Year-Old Cave Painting Is The Oldest Story Ever Recorded, December 15, 2019, https://arstechnica.com/science.

Wikipedia, Celebese Warty Pig, https://en.wikipedia.orb/wiki/Celebes_warty_pig

 

A PETROGLYPHIC AGE NOTATION?

Picture Canyon, Baca County, Colorado. Photograph Peter Faris, 21 September 1986.

In Picture Canyon, southeast Colorado, there is a petroglyph of a woman’s figure with seventeen circles (sixteen complete and one incomplete) on her torso. Previous discussion as to what they represent has focused on decorative patterns on her clothing, or showing that she is a victim of smallpox with the circles supposedly representing the lesions on her body. I am writing this to suggest a different possibility - that the circles on her torso represent her age.

Picture Canyon, Baca County, Colorado. Internet photo, Public Domain.

The petroglyph has been chalked (or perhaps highlighted with white paint) at some indeterminate time in the past and seems to sport an intricate hairdo. This hairdo has been speculated to represent butterfly hair whorls as worn by adolescent unmarried young Hopi women. The circles on her torso are not freestanding, most are connected to each other by short lines.

E. B. Renaud's record, "Eighth Report: Pictographs and Petroglyphs of the High Western Plains (1936)."

The first record of this petroglyph that I have been able to find is a black and white drawing in E. B. Renaud’s Eighth Report: Pictographs and Petroglyphs of the High Western Plains (1936). In this report Renaud illustrated the petroglyph and designated it as site 147. He defined it as a representation of smallpox. The illustration in Renaud’s report, however, fails to show the short line segments connecting the circles on the woman’s body. There are a number of other discrepancies in details between Renaud’s illustration and modern photos, but that is fairly common with Renaud’s illustrations and reports. He used many local residents as agents and informants and did not apparently double check much of the material they provided.

In his report “Picture Writing of the American Indians”, Garrick Mallery gave the following description of time notation by the Dakota tribe.

Fig. 182, page 265, Mallery, Garrick, 1936, Eighth Report: Pictographs and Petroglyphs of the High Western Plains.

“Dr. William H. Corgusier, surgeon, U.S. Army, gives the following information: ‘The Dakotas make use of the circle as the symbol of a cycle of time; a small one for a year and a large one for a longer period of time, as a life time, one old man. Also a round of lodges or a cycle of seventy years, as in Battiste Good’s Winter Count. The continuance of time is sometimes indicated by a line extending in a direction from right to left across the page when on paper, and the annual circles are suspended from the line at regular intervals by short lines as in Fig. 182, upper character, and the ideograph for the year is placed beneath each one. At other times the line is not continuous, but is interrupted at intervals by the yearly circle, as in the lower character of Fig. 182.’” (Mallery 1893:285)

As Mallery’s Fig. 182 illustrates a succession of years can be presented by a row of circles connected by short lines exactly as represented on the body of the figure in Picture Canyon. The figure in Picture Canyon has sixteen full circles and one partial inscribed on her torso, suggesting that, if this interpretation is correct, it represents a young woman of seventeen years in age.

              

Sioux lands defined by the 1868 treaty, Internet photo, Public Domain.

Picture Canyon is somewhat marginal to the area acknowledged as Dakota traditional hunting grounds according to the 1868 Treaty, but well within the area they would have claimed traditional rights to so a Dakota convention for illustrating time would seem to be a possibility.

Picture Canyon, Baca County, Colorado. Photograph William Buckles, 1989.

This site was also studied by Dr. William Buckles in 1989 but notes on the margins of his slide suggest that he accepted Renaud's identification of the figure as a victim of smallpox. Buckles also inexplicably refers to this figure as masculine - "Smallpox Man."

Chaiwa, a Tewa Indian girl with a butterfly whorl hairstyle. Photo by Edward S Curtis in 1922.

Concerning the hair style indicated on the figure, some think it resembles the “butterfly” hairdo of young, unmarried Hopi maidens. This is sometimes suggested to have resulted from the influence of Pueblo Indian refugees from Deigo de Vargas’ reconquest of New Mexico in 1692, after the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 that had driven the Spanish out. I have found no record of Hopi refugees in the area of southeastern Colorado, and no indication that any other pueblo refugees would have been wearing that hairstyle even if they reached the area, so I consider that particular assumption as unlikely. Could a Dakota Indian have traveled to Hopi and seen that hairstyle? Possibly. That particular question will have to remain open for now.

Picture Canyon, Baca County, Colorado. Photograph Peter Faris, 21 September 1986.

So, is this particular figure in Picture Canyon, Colorado, a figure of a smallpox victim as Renaud suggested, or a picture commemorating a seventeen-year-old young lady? I don’t suppose we will ever know for sure, but it does suggest that we should not hurry to jump to conclusions about what rock art means. There will usually be other possibilities we have not yet considered.

NOTE: I wish to thank Aaron Ramirez, Manager of Special Collections and Museum Services, Pueblo City and County Library District, Pueblo, Colorado, for providing the photograph by Dr. Bill Buckles and all the information pertaining to it.

Also: some images in this posting were retrieved from the internet with a search for public domain photographs. If any of these images are not intended to be public domain, I apologize, and will happily provide the picture credits if the owner will contact me with them. For further information on these reports you should read the original reports at the sites listed below.

REFERENCES:

Slide, Picture Canyon, Baca County, Colorado, in the Colorado Rock Art Association Collection, Pueblo City-County Library District Special Collections, Pueblo, Colorado, USA.

Mallery, Garrick, 1936, Eighth Report: Pictographs and Petroglyphs of the High Western Plains (1936) Picture Writing of the American Indians, in Tenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnography to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888-1889, by J. W. Powell, Director, Government Printing Office, Washington DC., reprinted in two volumes in 1972 by Dover Publications, Inc. New York.

Renaud, E. B., 1936 Archaeological Survey of the High Western Plains: Eighth Report: Pictographs and Petroglyphs of the High Western Plains, September 1936, University of Denver, Anthropology Office, Denver, CO.