Rocks in Motion : Dakhleh Oasis Petroglyphs in the Context of Paths, Roads and Mobility.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Polkowski, Paweł L.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Petroglyphs.

Cultural landscapes.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (338 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Havertown : Oxbow Books, Limited, 2024.

Summary:

This monograph focuses on the Dakhleh Oasis petroglyphs within the context of paths, roads, and mobility in the Western Desert, exploring their significance over millennia. Edited by Colin A. Hope, the book presents a comprehensive study on the rock art of Dakhleh Oasis, examining its cultural and historical context from prehistoric times to the modern era. It offers insights into the geography, geology, and history of rock art research in the region, detailing the cultural units and climatic changes that influenced the artistic expressions. The work also reflects on the interplay between humans, animals, and the landscape, highlighting the dynamic interaction and movement that shaped the oasis's history. The intended audience includes scholars and researchers in archaeology, anthropology, and history, with a particular focus on those interested in desert cultures and rock art. Generated by AI.

Contents:

Cover

Book Title

Copyright

Contents

Foreword

Preface

Chapter 1 Introduction: Aims, Scope and Theoretical Toolkit

1.1. Aims of the study

1.2. Notes on the oasis' geography and the territorial scope of the study

The oasis' geography, geomorphology and geology

Territorial scope of the study

1.3. The history of rock art research in Dakhleh

Before the Second World War

The Dakhleh Oasis Project era

Research in the Dakhleh environs

1.4. Corpus under the study: Documentation and limiting factors

1.5. The current study: Approach, definitions, methods

Major theoretical concepts and terms employed in the study

Landscape

Ontology

BOX 1.1. ONTOLOGICAL TURN(S) IN ANTHROPOLOGY

Agency

Motion

Armed with concepts, ready to march out

Chapter 2 A 'Passage' Through Time: Routes and Movement in Dakhleh from Prehistory to Modern Times

2.1. Introduction: Dakhleh's space-time

2.2. Holocene climatic changes

Against determinism

Dynamics of climate

2.3. Prehistory: Early to middle Holocene hunter-gatherers (ca. 8250-5600 BCE)

The Masara and Bashendi A cultural units in Dakhleh

Hunter-gatherers on the move

BOX 2.1. TWO (TECHNO)COMPLEXES IN THE WESTERN DESERT

2.4. Prehistory: Middle Holocene hunters and cattle herders (ca. 5500-2200 BCE)

The Bashendi B 'pastro-foragers'

The last indigenes or the Sheikh Muftah cultural unit

2.5. Dynastic period: Old Kingdom and First Intermediate Period (ca. 2700-2000 BCE)

BOX 2.2. ABU BALLAS TRAIL

2.6. Dynastic period: Middle Kingdom to the end of the Late Period (ca. 2000-332 BCE)

Dakhleh during the Middle through New Kingdom periods

Third Intermediate Period to the end of the pharaonic era

2.7. Dakhleh in the last two millennia (332 BCE to the modern day)

Ptolemaic and Roman times: Fringes of the empire.

Islamic period onwards: Towards the oasis as we know it

2.8. Moving in the landscape that itself is on the move

Chapter 3 A Circle of Life? Prehistoric Anthropomorphic Petroglyphs and Knowledge of the World

3.1. Prehistoric rock art at Dakhleh: a preamble

3.2. Motif of a 'pregnant woman'

Primary characterisation

Distribution

Dating

BOX 3.1. LADIES HILL

3.3. 'Crux interpretum': Previous readings of the motif

The question of sex

3.4. Anthropomorphs in the Bashendi culture

People and their world(s)

BOX 3.2. NEW ANIMISM

Knowledge dwells in the landscape

3.5. …but knowledge of what?

Pregnancy revisited

Intercourse discourse

Anthropomorphs and animals

3.6. World in motion: a circle of life

Beyond the image

The audiences

Chapter 4 Animated Landscape of Animals

4.1. Animals and animacy

4.2. Prehistoric zoomorphic depictions in Dakhleh

Introductory comments on animal depictions in Dakhleh

Giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis)

Scimitar oryx (Oryx dammah)

Gazelles (Gazella and Nanger)

Ostrich (Struthio camelus)

Further remarks on the zoomorphic figures

BOX 4.1. SAVANNAH ANIMALS TODAY

4.3. Trapped between reality and symbols: Zoomorphs in Egypt's Western Desert

'Depiction of environment', or what hunters hunted

BOX 4.2. 'GIRAFE À LIEN'

4.4. Extending the social

Humans and animals: Togetherness

Shared life on the move

4.5. Zoomorphic rock art: a reassessment

Animals present in rock art

Nonhuman persons with animal bodies

BOX 4.3. MEANDERING CREATURES

4.6. World in motion: All things move

Chapter 5 Pharaonic Rock Art: Negotiating Identities

5.1. Dynastic rock art of Dakhleh: Introduction

Sphinx in the desert

Introductory remarks.

5.2. Rock art and the oasis colonisation (Old Kingdom to early Middle Kingdom): Watch posts, routes and identity

Petroglyphs at watch posts: a characterisation

Securing the dating

Identifying the marks of identity

Carving (out) the landscape

BOX 5.1. IS THERE SHEIKH MUFTAH ROCK ART?

5.3. Rock art moves in the landscape

Movement and the practice of petroglyphing: an example of the southern path

Attention, Attraction, Affordances

5.4. World in motion: Bringing Egypt to the desert

Chapter 6 In the Temple of Seth

6.1. The storm

6.2. Lord of the Oasis

6.3. Seth-related rock art in Dakhleh

Group 1: Southeast of Teneida

Group 2: Gryphon Site

Group 3: Central Dakhleh Oasis

Subgroup 3a: Seth Hill

Subgroup 3b: The environs of the southern path

Subgroup 3c: The environs of the northern path

A glimpse at the Kharga material

General remarks

6.4. Experiencing the landscape

Landscape as a body

To the West

Weather-world and the powers of Seth

6.5. The power of image

Deities on the route

Places of contact

Carvings as non-representations

Feet and sandals

Ontology of the image

Seth images reconsidered

6.6. World in motion: in the temple of Seth

Chapter 7 Epilogue: Time to Move on

7.1. Uncharted territories

7.2. Territories explored

Bibliography

Back Cover.

Notes:

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Part of the metadata in this record was created by AI, based on the text of the resource.

Other Format:

Print version: Polkowski, Paweł L. Rocks in Motion

ISBN:

9781789259766

OCLC:

1451803632