Pictographs or petroglyphs? You can see both in Lincoln County.
Pictographs of yellow, black, and red can be seen painted on light-colored rock surfaces. A mixture of sumac, yellow ochre, and pinyon gum was used to make a black powder; yellow from rabbit brush, and red from red ochre or the roots of mountain mahogany. Animal fat and plant oils may have been used to bind the powders together. Fingers, yucca fiber brushes, and hollow bird bones filled with pigment were the artist’s tools. This primitive bird bone “spray gun” was often used to spray around a hand placed on the rock.
A Petroglyph is an image or design cut into a rock surface without the use of pigment or coloring. In canyon country, desert-varnished sandstone was most commonly used. In desert areas, this brown or black varnish builds up on rocks after prolonged exposure to the elements. The tool usually used to produce petroglyphs was agate, chert, or jasper. [Read more …]
Big horn, prong horn, snakes, sun, moon, and people. Etchings and paintings on the rocks, meanings long lost, left by Ancient Native Americans throughout what is now Lincoln County. Can you guess the meanings?