(»42 MATERIALS TO WEITE UPON BEFORE INVENTION OF PRINTING. 



Fk;. 5. Designs on rock at Tegneby, BohuslUn, Sweden. 



KOCKS, CRUDE AND PLANED, BIT NOT DETACHED. 



The rui:»estriiie inscriptions, i^robably the most ancient of all, are 

 found in nearly every ])ortion of the f^lobe, more jiarticnlarly in Asia 



and Europe. Those 

 im^ ? ■ ~~— ^— -"^^ ^ that belong to the pre- 



historic p e r i o d a r e 

 traced or engraxcd di- 

 rectly upon the rouL'h 

 face of unplaned rock. 

 We may name as ex- 

 amples the cup rocks of 

 Hohenstein, at Swan- 

 sen ( Ge r m a n Ilol- 

 stein) ;" the sculptured 

 rocks of Tegneby. in 

 Ijohuslaii (fig. 5),'' and those of the " Eainsundsberget " Mountain, in 

 Sodermanland (Sweden). Some of these inscriptions were known 

 in the seventeenth century, for they were copied in 1627.'' 



The designs and figures engraved upon the granite masses on the 

 banks of the Yuba River in New Mexico are to be classed in the cate- 

 gory of pictographic writing (fig. G).'' 



In central Asia, Egypt, Assj'ria, and Persia, on the other hand, the 

 rocky surfaces intended to re- 

 ceive inscriptions were care- 

 fully planed and prepared; the 

 inscri lotions therefore stood out 

 very distinctly on the body of 

 the rock. Such is the case with 

 the famous inscription of Be- 

 histoun in the pass that sepa- 

 rates Persia from Mesoj^ota- 

 mia,'' the edicts of Agoka, en- 

 graved upon the rock at (lirnar, 

 in Guzerat (India). '^ We nuist 

 not neglect to mention the subterranean temples cut into the rocks," 



« Zeitschrift t'. Etlniologie, Vol. IV, 1872. pi. 14. 



^'Montelius (Oscar). La Suede prt'liistoriqiie, trad. J. H. Krauier. Stockboliu, 

 s. d., 8°, p. 04 seq. 



c Revue ureheol., 1S75, p. 137 scq. 



^ Siinonln (L.). De Washington a San Francisco (Tour du Monde, 1874. ]>. 240). 



c Morgan (.7. do). Mission scientifiquo on Porso (T. IV). 



f Berger (Phil.). Op. cit, p. 224. 



.•^Perrot (G.), Chipioz. Hist de I'art dans Tantiquite : I. Egypte, 1SS2, p. 411 

 seq. 



Fui. (!. Fragment of a hieroglyphic inscrip- 

 tion made by California Indiana on a granite 

 rock. 



