570 



NATURE 



[April 13, 1905 



?05 ^ 



NORTH AFRICAN PETROGLYPHS. 



A/T E. F. GAUTIER has published in l' Anthropologic 

 •'^ ■*• (xv., 1904, p. 497) an illustrated account of a recent 

 find of rock carvings in the ravine of Zenaga, between 



Oranais petroglyphs represent a ram or goat with a spheroid 

 on its head, provided with projecting appendages (Fig. 2). 

 It is suggested that the spheroid is a solar disc flanked on 

 each side by a snake (iiratiis), and this would be a re- 

 presentation of the great god Amnion, of Thebes. If this be 



. from Zenaga. Din 

 from the furthest point of the horns to Ihi 

 the body, a, 43 cm. ; fi, 39 cm. ; y, 53 c 



Fig. 3. — Touareg rock carving. Total height of the space occupied by the people 



Figuig and Beni-Ounif, in Sahara. The drawings are in 

 deep outline and of large size, sometimes life-size, and their 

 antiquity is established by the patina in the cuts being as 

 pronounced as that on the surface, and by the fact that 



Fig. 1.— Rock 



ng from Zenaga. Dimension, i metre from the bead to the 

 the design left white is carefully polished in the original. 



some of the animals represented, such as the elephant, no 

 longer exist there, while others, like the buffalo, are now 

 extinct. In Fig. i we have two recognisable portraits of 

 Bitbalus antiquiis and one of an elephant. Several South 



NO. 1850, VOL. 71] 



so, the question arises, did the inspiration of the South 

 Oranais engraving come from Egypt, or had the god 

 Ammon a Libyan origin? The goat (Ovis longipes) ol 

 Zenaga differs in some details from those of Bou-Alem, and 

 the " solar disc " is provided with 

 rays. The other drawings of this 

 problematic design were exhibited 

 at the International Congress of 

 Anthropology of 1900, and gave rise 

 to a long discussion. 



Rock carvings of a very different 

 character were discovered by the 

 author in the Touareg (Tawarek) 

 country on the first slopes of the 

 Hoggar (Ahaggar) massif, 200-300 

 kilometres south of In Salah. Some 

 are scribblings in which animals and 

 men are represented diagrammatic- 

 ally, and with these inscriptions are 

 associated. M. Flamand some tiine 

 ago described entirely similar graffiti 

 in South Oranais w-hich he identified 

 as " Libyco-berbferes. " The greater 

 part of the figures in this paper illus- 

 trate engravings of a very different 

 character, and are far less ancient 

 than those just referred to, for the 

 animals represented are forms that 

 still exist there. The presence of the 

 camel is very significant, since it is 

 generally admitted that it was only 

 introduced, or re-introduced, into 

 north-west Africa in the first cen- 

 turies of our era, and appears to 

 have been abundant there about the 

 period of Justinian. Other animals 

 represented are the horse, ass, cattle, 

 goat, moufflon, gazelle, dog, ostrich, 

 &c. The engraved portions differ in 

 their colour markedly from the rest 

 of the rock, and lack patina. From their appearance, 

 these petroglyphs may be recent, but it has been denied 

 that they have any relation with the Touaregs. Direct 

 evidence is afforded by the representations of men instead 



