Messak setafet

Vervet monkey from Wadi Methkandoush

The Messak Settafet (also called Amsach Settafed ) and "Messak Mellet" - the black and the white Messak - is a high plateau in the southwest of the Libyan Fessan . Various travel agencies organize camel trips there.

Heinrich Barth was the first European who crossed the plateau from east to west in 1850 and discovered and described the first rock art in this region in the area of Wadi Mathendous .

In addition to a diverse flora and fauna, the high plateau also has prehistoric rock carvings and rock engravings . Today the dry mountains are uninhabited. Thousands of rock carvings and artefacts point to earlier settlement and the corresponding climate. The rock art encompasses the 5 periods of the Sahara's pictorial styles: Bubalus, round head, cattle, horse and camel times.

Web links

• Rock paintings in the Messak at AARS (last accessed on March 27, 2020)
• Rock paintings in Wadi Mathendous (last accessed on April 28, 2020)
• Report on archeology and oil production (PDF file; 171 kB) (last accessed on November 30, 2012)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Travels and discoveries in North and Central Africa . Gotha 1855–1858 (Reprint Saarbrücken 2005: Vol. 1, ISBN 3-927-68824-X , page 210 ff.)

Coordinates: 25 ° 43 '  N , 12 ° 6'  E