Bold Line Geometric: Revisiting a Lesser-Known Rock Art Style in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands of Texas

Summary

This is an abstract from the "The Art of Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Bold Line Geometric is one of five currently identified rock art styles in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands of southwest Texas. It has previously been described as thick, glossy pigment applied in bold lines, geometric shapes, and globular anthropomorphic and zoomorphic forms. In 1965, David Gebhard laid the ground work for the initial description and definition of this abstract style using characteristics found at five sites. Solveig Turpin expanded this sample to 14 sites in 1986 and proposed Bold Line Geometric dated to the late archaic to protohistoric time periods based on relative preservation and superimpositioning with older styles, but problems with classification have plagued this style since its initial description. In 2017, Shumla launched the Alexandria Project to collect baseline data at all the known rock art sites within Val Verde County, Texas. Since the launch of this project, Shumla has identified at least 10 additional sites containing possible Bold Line Geometric imagery. This paper presents preliminary research revisiting the attributes, context, and chronology that define the style using this expanded dataset.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

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

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25762