Posted on 11/16/2014 9:42:34 AM PST by SunkenCiv
Dozens of rock art sites in southern New Mexico, recently documented for the first time, are revealing unexpected botanical clues that archaeologists say may help unlock the meaning of the ancient abstract paintings.
Over a swath of the Chihuahuan Desert stretching from Carlsbad to Las Cruces, at least 24 rock art panels have been found bearing the same distinctive pictographs: repeated series of triangles painted in combinations of red, yellow, and black.
And at each of these sites, archaeologists have noticed similarities not just on the rock, but in the ground.
Hallucinogenic plants were found growing beneath the triangle designs, including a particularly potent species of wild tobacco and the potentially deadly psychedelic known as datura.
Researchers believe that the plants may be a kind of living artifact, left there nearly a thousand years ago by shamans who smoked the leaves of the plants in preparation for their painting...
The region that Loendorf and his colleagues have been exploring was once home to the Jornada Mogollon, a culture of foraging farmers similar to the early Ancestral Puebloans, who occupied the territory from about the 5th to the 15th centuries.
Among the marks the Jornadans left on the land were sophisticated and colorful pictographs, ranging from recognizable plant, animal, and human forms to more abstract patterns.
They also crafted painted pottery in signature styles of red, brown, and black, known today as El Paso phase ceramics, which vary by era and design...
The triangle motifs first showed up at about 20 sites that the team surveyed at Fort Bliss, Loendorf said.
But it was during their second survey — of the lands around Carlsbad — that they noticed tobacco and datura growing under similar pictographs found there.
(Excerpt) Read more at westerndigs.org ...
Yep, certainly looks like something someone on LSD or peote’ would paint........I hope they didn’t end up cutting off an ear or something.
I was reading this thread
Two Rothko paintings fetch over $76 million at auction
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/3225812/posts
I think Hallucinogenics must have been involved there also.
Interesting and fascinating.
We can see why our society is becoming more primitive since the psychedelic revolution and widespread dope smoking.
;’)
“...But the police in Denver, they don’t like none of them longhairs around.”
Ouch !
I think scopolamine is the major chemical in datura above and beyond the atropine also present.
Really interesting article.
I would not be surprised if when one smoked too much and died they believed they were immediately transported to the otherwise unreachable world of the spirits they only could see smoking the plants.
They may have even believed they were pulled their using the sacred plant to abuse or calling.
What is of interest is atropine, scopolamine, even methyecgonine share the same base tropane, and differ only at the (?) ester bond.
The plants switch out the inorganic tail enzymatically while chemists have to use multiple steps to force the equation to the left.
OCCUPY sites already have wild tobacky present, hope they don’t hear about datura.. Be a shame. Lol
Maybe these were painted around 1969 by stoned hippies from Woodstock. Seems to be an antiwar theme in the patterns with some resembling a peace sign.
Or maybe Burning Man goes back even farther than we thought.
Alien Close Encounters on Peyote / Daytura:
Mulder drops his BigRed while tagging his site.
I was wondering about Jimson Weed known in the southwest and Mexico as locoweed and para loco respectively.
Smoke a doobie and check it out man. Far out.
It’s also the key to understanding a lot of music from the late 60’s.
It certainly is the key to decoding hippie music.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.