Petroglyphs

Our neighborhood is next door to Petroglyph National Park. A petroglyph is a figure carved, pecked, chipped or abraded into stone. In this case all the Petroglyphs are carved into volcanic boulders. I’ve always been fascinated with this ‘rock art’ carved by some ancient peoples thousands of years ago. I’ve sought out rock art sites in several states to take pictures and just to stand there and wonder about what some prehistoric man was trying to say. Or was it just some ancient adolescent graffiti?

My daughter goes to Petroglyph Elementary School. When we first enrolled her I thought it was really lame that their school mascot was a Macaw. What did a tropical bird have to do with Petroglyphs or the south western desert of New Mexico? Silly me. I found out on my first hike through the boulders in the national park. There wasn’t just one obvious parrot on a rock… but there were many. The ancient ancestors of the Native Americans valued the feathers of the macaw. There is evidence they traveled and traded with the Indians in the jungles of Mexico and South America.

Also I found the famous Kopepelli. He’s the happy and often well endowed little flute player you can find reproduced on any South Western Décor. Well, on home décor they leave off the part that shows he’s happy to see ya.



Kopepelli...he's happy to see you.




An ancient drawing of a macaw