WHALE HUNTING ARTISTS OF NORTHERN SIBERIA – THE PEGTYMEL PETROGLYPHS:

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Chukotka Travel.

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences.

One of the interesting things about us humans is the way we relate everything to ourselves. A rock art site in the far northeast corner of Russian Siberia is thought of as being way, way off in an isolated area. Of course, to the people who created the rock art it was not way off or isolated at all, it was their downtown, or at least their home territory.

Originally reported in a 1965 geological survey near the mouth of the Peftymel River, they were first visited and recorded in 1967 and 1968. (Dikov 1971:2)

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Online photograph, public domain.

    Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph                    Vladimir Devyatkin.

“In all we found 104 groups of illustrations, which we numbered successively for this publication in order of their location on the course of the river. Not all of these groups can be viewed as single compositions. More often they consist of illustrations from different time periods, sometimes lacking not only unity of subject but style and technique of execution. We grouped these petroglyphs only because of their location on the same panel of the cliff.” (Dikov 1971:7-8)

In 2021 another expedition to the site began newly recording all the rock art in detail according to an article in the Siberian Times by Svetlana Skarbo. Although her reporting has a number of factual errors in details it also included magnificent photographs of the area and the rock art from the Institute of Archaeology of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Bear hunt with dogs. Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Online photograph, public domain.

“The spectacular art gallery – was ‘opened’ at least two thousand years ago, when ancient artists embossed petroglyphs on rocks of what is now Chukotka, Russia’s easternmost corner.” (Skarbo 2021)

Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences.

“The Pegtymel petroglyphs were found by Soviet geologists in 1967 (1965 actually), high above the right bank of the Pegtymel River, a short distance from the East Siberian Sea.” (Skarbo 2021)

“In the summer of this year “the first scientific expedition since 2008 got to the site to start a major project on preserving unique stone drawings as they get destroyed with time. Five archeologists and three volunteers spent two weeks gathering photo material to create 3D models of Pegtymel petroglyphs, and to map the whole ‘gallery’.” (Skarbo 2021)

Whale hunt. Pegtymel petroglyphs, Russia. Photograph Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences.

Another assumption that we tend to make about people who lived way back then in an “isolated” area is that they are primitive. I cannot believe that any group of people who could hunt whales 2,000 years ago were culturally or technologically primitive. When archaeological work has provided artifacts and actual data about these people we will be able to make assumptions based on reality, but until then we can appreciate the petroglyph record they left us.

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:

Dikov, N. N., 1971, Mysteries in the Rocks of Ancient Chukotka (Petroglyphs of Pegtymel), translated by Richard L. Bland, Nauka Pub., Moscow.

Skarbo, Svetlana, 2021, Whale Hunting and Magic Mushroom People of 2,000-year-old Eurasia’s Northernmost Art Gallery, 14 September 2021, The Siberian Times, Novosibirsk, Russia