Indian God Rock

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Coordinates: 41 ° 19 ′ 48 ″  N , 79 ° 49 ′ 27 ″  W.

Map: Pennsylvania
marker
Indian God Rock​
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Pennsylvania
Rear view

The Indian God Rock (also Indian God Rock Petroglyphs Site , 36VE26) is a boulder in the northeast of the US state Pennsylvania . It is located near the Brandon Settlement in Rockland Township in Venango County .

It is a significant cultural monument because of the petroglyphs on one of the pages that Europeans have known since 1749. Because of these petroglyphs, the stone has become a target for surveyors, tourists and scientists.

geology

One of many boulders on the Allegheny River in Venango County, Indian God Rock is made of sandstone and measures approximately 22 × 14 × 10 feet . Since sandstone is relatively easy to engrave, the boulder provided an easy-to-machine surface for creating rock engravings.

history

Among the 55 (according to the registration form there were 56, see sources) different elements that are engraved into the surface of the rock, there are representations of people and animals in different contexts, but also abstract or symbolic forms. Two of the engravings show archers . This is the only known indigenous rock engraving in the Ohio Valley depicting archers. One scientist suggested that the similarity between various figures and drawings engraved in the boulder on birch bark documents suggest that the boulder may have been used by medicine men and the relative absence of martial themes indicates that the people who made the engravings belonged to a peaceful culture.

The age of the petroglyphs is uncertain. James Swauger , director of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History , who first examined them a few years after a first visit in 1958, assumes that they were made after the year 900, but probably after 1200, certainly before 1750. He suspects the ancestors of the Shawnee as the author (Proto-Shawnee). The rock is significant in the history of science insofar as after visiting this rock, Swauger became the best expert on petroglyphs in Ohio , Kentucky , the New England states of Maryland , New Jersey , New York , Virginia , West Virginia and in Pennsylvania. Donald Cadzow, a member of the State Historical Commission , had suspected the originators to be among the Algonquin in 1934.

The year 1749 is regarded as the terminus ante quem for the creation of the engravings, because the boulder and the representations were seen and reported by several members of a French expedition led by Pierre-Joseph Céléron de Blainville. The boulder apparently had a religious meaning for the local Indians . One member of the expedition reported that the accompanying guides "viewed the rock with superstitious awe". Apart from examining the boulder and disregarding the "savages" who had created the engravings, the expedition attached two lead plates to document France's claim to the area, as had been done on numerous other landmarks. While some of them have survived, those at Indian God Rock have been lost. According to the records, the inscription on the second lead plate read: “Aout 3me, 1749. Enterre une plaque de plomb sur la rive meridionale de la rivière Oyo, a 4 lieues, au dessous de la riviere aux boeufs, vis-à-vis une montagne pelle, et aupres d'une grave pierre, sur laquelle on voit plusieurs figures essez grossierement gravees. ”(analogously: August 3, 1749. A lead plate attached to the south bank of the Ohio, four leuges below the ' Cattle River ', opposite a bold rock , and on a large stone on which you can see several, rather roughly engraved figures).

In the 19th century, Indian God Rock became a tourist attraction, with steamboats on the Allegheny River stopping there to give passengers a chance to view the boulder. In the 19th century at the latest, the monolith had suffered from natural erosion from driftwood and weather influences as a result of vandalism . An investigation report from 1887 complained that names had been scratched.

The figural representations are sometimes difficult to recognize today, among other things because the engravings were traced with chalk until the 1960s - a technique that is no longer conceivable today that endangers the objects and obscures the petroglyphs. The same applies to the occasional use of salt or mud to clarify the lines.

Under these circumstances it was extremely difficult to make the Indian God Rock a meaningful subject for archaeological research. As the first petroglyph boulder documented and researched in the Ohio valley , it is considered the outstanding example of such rock art in the region. The United States Forest Service names the monolith as the most important of the 75 archaeological sites of Native American cultures in this section of the river, which is designated as the National Wild and Scenic River .

For a long time it was discussed whether the contemporary Indians were the authors of the works, because they did not comment on it. Even Edmund Burke Delabarre suspected 1928 two reasons. On the one hand, the works might seem to them to be of little importance; on the other hand, they did not like to talk to the non-indigenous scientists about their culture or not at all. On May 14, 1984, the National Park Service added the boulder to the National Register of Historic Places .

The boulder, which can also be seen from watercraft on the river on the left bank, is on the route of a line of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad that was closed after 1982 . Today, the Middle Allegheny River Water Trail passes near the boulder and hikers can view Indian God Rock from a vantage point. To allow an unobstructed view of the rock without touching it, a wooden platform was built by the Venango Museum of Art, Science & Industry in Oil City and the Allegheny Valley Trails Association . The latter also built a cycle path here. Driving forces were Jim Holden, President of AVTA, and Beverly Chiarulli, President of the Pennsylvania Archeological Council . The incisions of the names, which are mostly viewed as mere vandalism, were examined as historical sources themselves in 2000 and 2001, as they go back well into the 19th century.

swell

literature

  • James L. Swauger: The Indian God Rock Petroglyph Site 36VE36 , in: Pennsylvania Archaeologist 47 (1977) 1-13.
  • Alan R. Geyer, William H. Bolles: Outstanding Scenic Geologic Features of Pennsylvania (= Environmental Geology Report 7). Part 1. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania - Department of Environmental Resources - Bureau of Topographic and Geologic Survey, Harrisburg PA 1979, ISBN 0-8182-0080-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Indian God Rock ( English ) In: Geographic Names Information System . United States Geological Survey . Retrieved December 14, 2009.
  2. ↑ All locations are numbered in the USA. The first two digits stand for the state (36 for Pennsylvania), followed by a two-letter abbreviation for the county (here: Venango County), then a sequential number in the order of the time of discovery.
  3. ↑ Sarepta Kussart: The Allegheny River , Burgum, 1928, p. 14
  4. ^ Pennsylvania Archaeologist 72-75 (2002), p. 58.
  5. ↑ James L. Swauger: Petroglyphs of Ohio , Ohio University Press, 1984, p. 269.
  6. ^ Emily Uhrin, Guide to the Papers of James L. Swauger , Anthropology Department of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History 2007, unpublished manuscript, p. 3.
  7. ^ Donald A. Cadzow: Petroglyphs Rock Carvings in the Susquehanna River Near Safe Harbor, Pennsylvania , Pennsylvania Historical Commission, 1934, p. 50 f.
  8. ^ Paul G. Bahn: The Cambridge Illustrated History of Prehistoric Art , Cambridge University Press, 1998, p. 19.
  9. ^ Charles Burleigh Galbreath: Expedition of Celoron to the Ohio Country in 1749 , FJ Heer, Columbus, Ohio 1921, p. 120 ( online , PDF).
  10. ↑ What was probably meant was the lieue commune, which measured 4,452 m, because the lieue, measuring 10 km, was only introduced in 1800.
  11. ^ Charles Burleigh Galbreath: Expedition of Celoron to the Ohio Country in 1749 , FJ Heer, Columbus, Ohio 1921, pp. 120 f.
  12. ^ John W. Powell : Introduction. In: Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. 8, 1886/1887, pp. XVIII-XXVI, here pp. XXII f.
  13. ↑ Fred E. Coy, Thomas C. Fuller, Larry G. Meadows, James L. Swauger: Rock Art of Kentucky. University Press of Kentucky, Lexington KY 1997, ISBN 0-8131-1986-3 , pp. 4 f.
  14. ^ Art Michaels: Pennsylvania Overlooks. A Guide for Sightseers and Outdoor People , Penn State University Press, 2002, p. 7.
  15. ↑ Edmund Burke Delabarre : Dighton Rock. A Study of the Written Rocks of New England. Walter Neale, New York NY 1928, p. 121 .
  16. ^ National Register Information System . In: National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service. Archived from the original on December 15, 2010. Retrieved April 14, 2014.
  17. ↑ James L. Swauger: The Indian God Rock Petroglyph Site 36VE36 , in: Pennsylvania Archaeologist 47 (1977) 1-13, here: p. 1.