Rock Art, Animals, and Desert Landscapes: A Case Study from the Black Desert of Jordan

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In the late 1st millennium BC and the early 1st millennium AD, nomadic groups inhabited the Black Desert of northern Arabia. These desert societies are elusive, having left behind few material remains and archaeological research having been scarce. What we know about them has been based almost solely on the inscriptions they carved into the basalt rocks. Yet the nomads also carved a wealth of pictorial engravings, figurative rock art depicting wild and domestic animals, hunting, pastoral, and fighting scenes, and geometric symbols. Until now the rock art has been under-studied and under-utilised as a source of information about these societies. This paper presents the results of the first-ever systematic study of the ‘Safaitic’ rock art of the Black Desert. It discusses the content of the rock art, how it was produced and consumed, and its relationship to the landscape. These results reveal how the rock carvings played an essential role in connecting people to each other and to place in the desert landscape. This paper also discusses how the rock art challenges traditional dichotomies about herder and hunter relationships with animals and their environment.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 24662