Prehistoric rock art is the markings – paintings, engravings, or pecked images – left on rocks or cave walls by ancient peoples. In this book, Paul G. Bahn provides a richly illustrated overview of prehistoric rock art and cave art from around the world. Summarizing the recent advances in our understanding of this extraordinary visual record, he discusses new discoveries, new approaches to recording and interpretation, and current problems in conservation. Bahn focuses in particular on current issues in the interpretation of rock art, notably the “shamanic” interpretation that has been influential in recent years and that he refutes. This book is based on the Rhind Lectures that the author delivered for the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland in 2006.
Author(s): Paul G. Bahn
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2010
Language: English
Pages: 238
City: Cambridge
Half-title
Title
Copyright
Dedication
Contents
Figures
Foreword
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. Art on the rocks
Stone horse and papal bull
Saints and devils
Some 17th- and 19th-century visitors
Earliest photos and stampings
The Picasso myth
‘Amateurs’ and rock art
Lhote and a pinch of salt
Copies, snaps, and rubbings
Continuing discoveries
2. Myths and meanings
Apparently straightforward depictions
Making tracks
Dominant animals
Sex and violence
Fantastic animals and therianthropes
Myths and other meanings
Leaps of faith
Conclusion
3. The emperor’s new clothes I: sloppy tailoring
A personal history
The ‘three-stage’ model and ‘entoptics’
The ‘three-stage’ model and ‘trance’
The Eliade fraud
‘Shamans’ and drugs
The cave in the mind: Clottes and grottes
4. The emperor’s new clothes II: fashion disasters
Central Asia: spot the shaman
Southern Africa: snoring and bloody noses
North Africa: do you believe in flying sorcerers?
North America: the Coso Nostra
Latin America: desperately seeking Eliade
Europe: Ice Age follies
Charge! Run away!
Conclusion
Coda: the ‘top ten of silliness’
5. Location, location, location
Tangible and intangible
The architecture of the rock or wall
The local landscape: wet and noisy
Markers and monuments
Visibility and views
Accessibility: the public and the private
The architecture of rocks, caves, and the landscape
Conclusion
6. The votive motive
Earliest offerings
Excavation and ethnography
Conclusion
7. Mustn’t crumble
Natural factors
Human factors
Recording disasters
No publicity, please
Conservation measures
Death by bureaucracy
Conclusion
Conclusion
Select bibliography
Index
