A PETROGLYPH OF BIGHORN SHEEP PLAYING PATTICAKE AT NINE-MILE CANYON:

 Column for 1 April, 2025.

Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep, lambs playing. Internet image, public domain.

We have all seen photographs of lambs playing, we have probably all seen photographs of bighorn sheep lambs playing at head-butting. Now, from Nine-Mile Canyon in Utah we have photographic proof of adult bighorn sheep playing, not head-butting, but patticake.

Petroglyph panel, Nine-Mile Canyon, Utah. Photograph Peter Faris, 1993.

I took the photograph in 1993, of the entire panel in question in Nine-Mile Canyon, Utah.

Close-up of bighorn sheep playing patticake, petroglyph panel, Nine-Mile Canyon, Utah. Photograph Peter Faris, 1993.

In this close-up you can see it more clearly. Now, I know this seems a little far-fetched, but the only other possible explanation is that they are Siamese Twins with two grown sheep sharing the same hoofs, and that seems really a bridge too far.

So, now I find it encouraging that with the state of the world as it is we can still learn something new about the animals that share the planet with us – at least on April First.

ROCK ART OF EL MORRO, NEW MEXICO:

 

El Morro, Cibola County, NM.

Photograph: Peter Faris, June 1993.

I have formerly posted some columns on historic inscriptions found at Morro Rock, in Cibola County, New Mexico. This interesting site has a permanent water tank at its base, a huge premium in this arid landscape, and the ruins of an ancestral Puebloan village on its summit. Long known for the large number of historic inscriptions carved into the rock face which record many episodes from the history of New Mexico and the southwest, it is less well known for Native American ancestral Puebloan rock art left carved into its surface by early inhabitants. Much of this ancestral Puebloan rock art has been defaced and overcarved by later inscriptions which are now considered to be historic. Those inscriptions record much of the history of the Spanish and American periods in the American southwest by providing a ledger of who was passing by Morro Rock, and often why they were there, and they provide an interesting historic resource in their own right. But, in this posting, I intend to look at the prehistoric rock art that can still be seen at Morro Rock.

 

 

Atsinna pueblo, El Morro, Cibola County, NM.

Photograph: Peter Faris, June 1993.

"Atsinna Pueblo, the largest of the pueblos atop El Morro, dates from about 1275. Its builders made use of what they had around them: flat sedimentary rock easily cut up as slabs they could pile one on top of another and cement with clay and pebbles. The pueblo was about 200 by 300 feet, and it housed between 1,000 and 1,500 people. Multiple stories of interconnected rooms - 875 have been counted -- surrounded an open courtyard. Corn and other crops were grown in irrigated fields, down on the plain; the surplus was stored in well-sealed rooms in the pueblo against times of need. The grinding bins and fire pits remain today. Cisterns on top of the mesa collected rainwater. The pool at its base was often used too, as hand-and-toe steps on the cliff face attest. An alternate trail for the residents may have followed the one that is still in use." (http://www.nps.gov/elmo/learn/historyculture/atsinna.htm)

 

 

Petroglyphs, El Morro, Cibola County, NM.

Photograph: Peter Faris, June 1993.

 The subjects that can be seen in the remaining rock art around the base of Morro Rock seem to be fairly common ancestral Pueblo themes. Human figures, animals, hand and foot prints, concentric circles, etc.
 

 

Petroglyphs, El Morro, Cibola County, NM.

Photograph: Peter Faris, June 1993.
 

Note the lovely row of bighorn sheep crossing the middle of this panel. Deeply carved and of excellent preservation, they are familiar to many as one of the most photographed petroglyph groups at El Morro.

Petroglyphs, El Morro, Cibola County, NM.

Photograph: Peter Faris, June 1993.

And above is my favorite, a roadrunner. Note the topknot projecting from the back of his head. This is a very common animal in this environment in the desert southwest.

 

Petroglyphs, El Morro, Cibola County, NM.
 

Spread-legged human  figures that are so familiar in ancestral Puebloan rock art. The dates for occupation of Asinna on top of Morro Rock fall in the late Pueblo III to early Pueblo IV periods, and Shaafsma puts the style of rock art at El Morro as "Plateau Anasazi mixed with Rio Grande Style." (Schaafsma 1992:25)

Given the historic importance of the Spanish and American inscriptions, it is perhaps understandable that the rock art of El Morro is not better known, but it is a shame. It fully deserves as much attention as other rock art sites. Stop in if you are ever in that part of New Mexico, it is well worth a visit. 

REFERENCES:

http://www.nps.gov/elmo/learn/historyculture/atsinna.htm

Schaafsma,Polly

1992      Rock Art in New Mexico, Museum of New Mexico Press, Santa Fe.

 

 

 

 

ROCK ART THEMES ON OTHER MEDIA - MOGOLLON BIGHORN SHEEP DESIGNS:

Bighorn maze, Three-Rivers Petroglyph Site, New Mexico.

Photograph: December 1988, Jack and Esther Faris.

This intriguing petroglyph is from the great Three Rivers Petroglyph Site in New Mexico. More than 21,000 glyphs of birds, humans, animals, fish, insects and plants, as well as numerous geometric and abstract designs are scattered over 50 acres of New Mexico's northern Chihuahuan Desert. The petroglyphs at Three Rivers, dating back to between about 900 and 1400 AD, were created by Jornada Mogollon people.

It shows a complicated design of desert bighorn sheep heads at the ends of lines. These are often referred to in the literature as Bighorn staffs (like a walking stick). One problem with the identification as staffs is that the lines are not straight; after extending a short distance below the bighorn head they bend off at an extreme angle, even shooting straight up. Also, as far as I can tell, Mogollon artifacts recovered to date do not include bighorn-sheep-headed staffs (although I do not pretend to have a comprehensive knowledge of Mogollon collections on museum shelves). So they are probably not staffs. This design has also been referred to as a bighorn maze which might make a little more sense, but, of course, we have no real idea as to its intention. No-one can seemingly come up with a suggestion as to why they felt the need to create a maze with bighorn sheep heads on it – other than the catchall “for ritualistic purposes” which we all too often fall back on when we don’t really have an idea at all.

Mimbres bowl, cover photo from Brody, J. J., Catherine J. Scott,

and Steven A. LeBlanc,1983, Mimbres Pottery: Ancient Art of the

American Southwest, Hudson Hills Press, New York. 

My fascination with this design is partly founded in its resemblance to the design on a classic Mimbres pottery bowl from the Mattocks site, now in the Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, The University of New Mexico, Albuquerque. The bowl measures H. 4 ⅛ in. (10.5 cm), diam. 9 ¼ in. (23.5 cm). (Brody et al. 1983:15) Mimbres pottery dates from a period of about six hundred years (AD 550 – 1150). “ Gila River  Rio Grande Valley and it western tributaries in southwest New Mexico. Differentiation between the Mimbres branch and other areas of the Mogollon culture area is most apparent during the Three Circle (AD 825-1000 roughly) and Classic Mimbres (AD 1000-1150) phases, when architectural construction and black and white painted pottery assume locally distinctive forms and styles” (Wikipedia). The design on this bowl has two mountain sheep heads on the ends of lines, which take off at angles much like the design of the petroglyph. I find the resemblance striking.

General Mogollon culture area. Three Rivers Petroglyph

Site is the star at the upper right, and the bowl came

from roughly the location of the star on the left.

So, is there any real connection, or just a coincidence? Mimbres pottery was produced within a portion of the Mogollon cultural area so geographically we can say they may be connected. Thematically they are obviously similar. The dates of Classic Mimbres pottery (AD 1000 – 1150) fall easily within the span of the production of petroglyphs at Three Rivers. Although I still have to admit that I do not know the significance of the design of the bighorn sheep head on the end of lines like this I do think that both the Mimbres bowl in question, and the petroglyph at Three Rivers, may well have some motivation in common, perhaps they refer to a commonly held belief, or a material item generally recognized throughout the Mogollon territory, so yes, I say they are certainly connected - at least in my mind. What do you think?

REFERENCES:

Brody, J. J., Catherine J. Scott, and Steven A. LeBlanc

1983    Mimbres Pottery: Ancient Art of the American Southwest, Hudson Hills Press, New York.

Wikipedia

A BIGHORN SHEEP TRAP PETROGLYPH NEAR MOAB:

Sheep trap petroglyph near Moab, UT. Photo Dell Crandall.

This first illustration is a petroglyph that was provided by Dell Crandall in Moab, UT., it apparently shows a bighorn sheep trap. This might be a natural trap like Dead Horse Point near Moab where a high pinnacle is connected to the rest of the mountain by a narrow neck and once the animals were driven out onto it they could be confined easily with no way down.

The petroglyph consists of a circular shape with a funnel-shaped entrance, and what appears to be footprints or animal tracks entering it and then circling around. This seems to represent exactly what we would expect to see happen in real life in such a scenario. Outside the wings of the trap are a group of quadrupeds (apparently bighorn sheep) which may illustrate the herd grazing on the slope below the trap.

Bighorn sheep trap wings with corral section at center, near 

DuBois, WY. Photo Peter Faris, September 1998.

The other photographs are of an actual constructed bighorn sheep trap in the Shoshone National Forest of the Wind River mountains above DuBois, Wyoming. This trap was constructed by the Shoshone group called “Sheep Eaters” and may, in fact, be early historic in date. Assembled of wood (stumps, trunks, and branches) it consists of a central corral and a long pair of fences in a “v-shape” leading to the opening of the corral. This trap is located on a high mountain saddle in heavily forested area.

Bighorn sheep trap central corral section, near 

DuBois, WY. Photo Peter Faris, Sept. 1998.

We assume that the way that these traps worked was for a group of people to start somewhere down near the bottom of the slope at a time that bighorn sheep were known to be grazing there. As a long line the people would then start up the slope making noise. Any animals above them on the hillside would presumably want to be farther away so they would also begin to drift upward toward the saddle that would allow them to cross to the other side and down into the next valley. As they approached that saddle they would run into the wings of the trap deflecting them toward the center. In the center there was a low wall that they would want to jump over at some point to continue to escape the approaching people, but this led them into the corral.

In either case a limited amount of exertion by a group of people would presumably reward them with a large amount of game. If we are to assume that some rock art actually does represent hunting (which I think very few would deny) then this petroglyph is quite likely to represent exactly what it looks like, a bighorn sheep trap. 

BIGHORN SHEEP PETROGLYPHS - GROCERIES, OR METAPHOR?:

Fremont Indian State Park, Utah.

Photo: Peter Faris, 1992.

Back in the 1980s I was invited to speak about rock art at a meeting being held in the town of Springfield in southeastern Colorado. As part of the presentation I was talking about bighorn sheep petroglyphs which are very common in that area. I don’t honestly remember exactly what I was saying about them, but I was rudely interrupted from the floor by someone who stood up and loudly proclaimed that LaVan Martineau had solved the question of bighorn sheep petroglyphs. “They are a metaphor for travel.  The clues needed to understand their meaning are that the length of the legs represents the distance to be traveled, and the contour of the belly of the sheep represents how rough the country to be crossed is. Bighorn sheep petroglyphs with a deeply rounded belly show the contour of the country to consist of deep valleys, in other words rough country with plenty of mountains and valleys to cross”(Martineau 1973).  

The photograph of petroglyphs from Fremont Indian State Park in Utah includes two bighorn petroglyphs. According to Martineau that would refer to two trips, presumably taken by the maker of the images. Also, their bodies are shaped differently so that means that the country they passed through varied on those trips.

From The Rocks Begin to Speak, LaVan Martineau, 1976, p.122.

In his book, The Rocks Begin To Speak, Martineau illustrates a mountain sheep (which he calls a goat) and his analysis says that the “symbol – of a goat with four legs signifies travel”. Martineau proceeded to read this image as the story of Major John Wesley Powell’s exploratory voyage through the Grand Canyon in 1869. “The horn incorporates with the goat’s back to form a V on its side, meaning open, or an opening – in this case the opening of a canyon, the Grand Canyon itself. This highest horn is also crooked, denoting the crookedness of the canyon, it also forms the goat’s head to denote going into a crooked canyon’’ (Martineau 1973:122).

Martineau went on to explain that “the other horn traversing the full length of this goat’s back indicates a journey the full length, or from one end to the other of this canyon. This lower horn is a single one, a doubled horn would indicate a safe journey. This was obviously not the case , since the Paiutes killed three of Major Powell’s men who had left the expedition, supposedly near Separation Rapids”. As I have previously written, Martineau claimed that he learned to read the symbols in rock art during training for the US Army Intelligence Corps. Well, I also went through the US Army Intelligence Corps training and served in the US Army Intelligence Corps, and I can testify that there was nothing in that training that had any relevance to rock art.

Wounded bighorn sheep, Three Rivers Petroglyph Park,

New Mexico. Photo: Jack and Esther Faris, 1988.

In fact the illustration of the bighorn sheep from Three Rivers Petroglyph Park in New Mexico with three arrows sticking in him provides strong evidence that at least some bighorn sheep rock art represents groceries.

Flint blade from Baca County, Colorado.

Drawn by Peter Faris, 1994.

Shortly after the episode in Springfield, I had the opportunity to view a cache of large blade tools that had been discovered in a rock shelter in that same area by the wife of the rancher that owned that particular parcel of land. These impressive blades had been struck out of Alibates flint. I borrowed one of the blade tools which was chipped into an effective knife blade, and turned it over to Dr. Richard Marlar, who was at that time perfecting his techniques for detecting and identifying blood protein residues on stone tools. He had discovered the amazing durability of blood protein residues which last for surprisingly long periods of time on a stone surface. Dr. Marlar ran his tests on this blade and found positive signs of bison, deer, sheep, and rabbit blood on that blade. In other words, back before it was cached prehistorically this blade had been used as a knife to cut up those animals, or at least had come into contact with blood from those animals. From this we can probably deduce that the ancient inhabitants of southeastern Colorado had hunted and butchered bighorn sheep, probably the desert bighorn variety.

To me this fact provides a strong piece of evidence that the ancient images of bighorn sheep are more likely to have represented hunting records and food resources, than they are to have represented metaphors for travel. Which brings us back to the original question, are bighorn sheep petroglyphs statements about hunting a food source (groceries), or are they a metaphor for travel? In my view the Alibates flint blade that had butchered bighorn sheep also butchered the idea of the bighorn being a metaphor for travel, but I do not expect that this reasoning will affect true believers.

On the other hand, if we want to make up a meaning that satisfies both possibilities it would be that the bighorn sheep petroglyph represents the food needed for the trip – groceries and travel metaphor in one! However, our making it up has no bearing on the truth of the situation. The risk here is in believing our own pronouncements too seriously. Remember, we are trying to figure out what the ancient peoples who produced the rock art meant by it, not trying to figure out what we think it might mean. There is often a big difference