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Routes and Boats: New Rock Art in the Sudanese Eastern Desert

par Cooper, Julien JC;Vanhulle, Dorian
Référence Stone Canvas: Towards a Better Integration of "Rock Art" and "graffiti" Studies in Egypt and Sudan (1: 10th-12th November 2019: Institut français d'archéologie orientale & Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology, Cairo)
Publication Non publié, 2019-11-12

Communication à un colloque

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Résumé :

In 2018, a SARS-Yale mission discovered several new rock art sites in the Sudanese Eastern Desert. One of these sites, situated along a ridge east of the Second Cataract, contained a large tableau of boat petroglyphs of likely Naqada III age along with other features including cupules, tally marks, and sandals. The site contains other unique features, including a natural hole on the rock surface with artificial embellishments. The iconographic theme of the naval procession found at this site, which is well known in Upper Egypt and the Nubian Nile and typical of Naqada II-III, is not frequently encountered in this desert - although it is difficult to ascertain whether this observation is a real feature or merely the result of lack of surveys in the region.This discovery, along with that of other engravings discovered by previous missions in the area, poses many questions related to human activity in the Eastern Desert of Sudan and to the presence of Nile cultures (Naqada, A-Group) in this vast territory. One can indeed wonder how these cultures interacted with indigenous peoples of this region. Is there a chronological overlap between indigenous rock art sites, represented by local pastoralist-themed traditions, and ‘foreign’ rock art using Naqadian iconography? These questions are broad in scope and it has long been considered that the answers are long lost. Fortunately, heuristic tools can assist in piecing the ancient history of this region and shaping approaches of how we view rock art as a human activity in this remote and distant landscape.