Posted on 05/05/2022 12:16:02 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The largest cave drawings in North America have been discovered in Alabama, according to a study by Jan F. Simek, Stephen Alvarez, and Alan Cressler in the archaeology journal Antiquities.
The five large figures discovered include three anthropomorphs (human-like figures), one swirling, enigmatic figure, and a snake, most likely an eastern diamondback rattlesnake which was sacred to Southeast Indigenous people of the time. The smallest figure measures about 3 feet and the largest, the snake, stretches to about 10 feet in length, marking the largest known known cave drawings in North America. The drawing were not made with pigment but rather incised into the walls.
It is unknown what the figures represented to the Native Americans who made them in the Middle Woodland period of some 2,000 years ago.
“They are not recognisable characters from ethnographically recorded Southeast Native American stories, nor from archaeologically known iconographic materials,” write the scholars in their article. “They do, however, share certain themes with other known regional rock art, such as anthropomorphs wearing regalia, rattlesnakes and symbolic emergence from rock. Thus, they probably depict characters from previously unknown religious narratives.”
Additionally, the researchers explain that Native Americans of the American Southeast saw caves as entrances to the underworld, and thus the figures probably represent spirits which typically reside in that divine space, which differ from the spirits of the upper world.
The discovery was made possible by the use of 3D photogrammetry, a technique in which many photos of a space are taken and then used to model a 3D rendering of a space.
The cave in which the drawings were made has very low ceilings, meaning that to view even the smaller drawings that adorn the cave, which were discovered in 1998, one has to be lying down. But once the ceiling was mapped out these large figures invisible to the naked eye appeared.
“They are so large that the makers had to create the images without being able to see them in their entirety,” the scholars wrote. “Thus, the makers worked from their imaginations, rather than from an unimpeded visual perspective.”
Before this accidental discovery, photogrammetry was not used to find unseen drawings, but the scholars predict that this technology may unlock new glyphs in American caves.
“It is unknown what the figures represented to the Native Americans who made them in the Middle Woodland period of some 2,000 years ago.”
Actually, that’s not that long ago, all things considered.
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No it’s not. Considering this:
“They are not recognisable characters from ethnographically recorded Southeast Native American stories, nor from archaeologically known iconographic...”
It seems a genocide took place and the group that drew these was wiped out.
Early snake handler religion in northeast AL . . . Dated a gal from up that way in college. . . .
Cave Porn.....................
Notice where his right hand is also. 🙂
I did not know there were Ents in North America
When the Europeans arrived her in the late 15th century, the indigenous Americans were literally still in the stone age. LOL
Copper was known and worked but not widely available. No bronze though
I didn’t know the American indians used copper. Any idea which tribes and what it was for?
The native copper came from up around Lake Superior I believe and was exported down the Mississippi river. The use as I recall was mostly ornamental.
In Chaco Canyon New Mexico and other anacazi sites, copper bells originating in Mexico were found.
There was a workshop at Cahokia that worked copper. That was where I became aware of the fact
At the zenith, Cahokia was larger than London.
Clearly a shamanic foreshadowing of the Spinal Tap airport scene.
There is a big cave up the road in Bangor Alabama where there was an illegal bar selling moonshine for years and years. The cave was a great big thing and the thing was an organized business at one time, but I don’t recollect any Truman Capote types around here that might have created the pornography. I knew some Wild Indians from around there of the Deliverance persuasion however.
One of the best bands in history.
L
I thought you were talking about “Spinal Tap” at first.
Are we going to do Stonehenge tonight?
Not exactly Lascaux drawings are they?
Got it thanks,
Lots of caves in Alabama.
Orson Welles
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