crossed views from southern africa
Dateless Substance White Pigments in the Rock Art of Southern Africa
Alice Mullen Alice Mullen has an MSc in Archaeology from the University of the Witwatersrand and has worked as a Tracing Technician at the Rock Art Research Institute. She specialises in the applications of New Animisms to San ontologies of rock art.
It is received wisdom in southern African rock art research that white pigments do not adhere to the rock face as well as other colours, and when present, indicate a more recent date – this coming, in part, from observable red and yellow antelope bodies whose once-white necks and heads have faded or disappeared (Bachelor 1990 in Meiklejohn, 1995; Loubser, 1991; Lewis-Williams and Dowson, 1992; Pearce, 2006). There is no evidence, however, to pinpoint in time when this disappearance happens, nor the rate at which any attrition occurs. That visible white pigment signifies a relatively young age for paintings has become a particularly odd, yet pertinent, problem in research pertaining to ’contact’ rock art and the making of Bushman (San) history in southern Africa (Mazel, 1989, 1992, 1993; Dowson, 1993, 1994). In the south-eastern mountains of the MalotiDrakensberg is a category of paintings known as Significantly Differentiated Figures (SDFs) – human forms that are more detailed and larger than those around them (Blundell, 2004). These oversized anthropomorphs were considered a recent phenomenon, created within the last two thousand years (after contact with incoming farmer groups). The presence of white pigment, considered the most fleeting of pigments, was used as a proxy for recent production, based on sparse studies, some of which are described below. Developments in pigment characterization within southern Africa
(Bonneau et. al, 2014), however, have shown that at least three distinct types of white paint materials (calcite, gypsum and white clay) were used by Bushman painters. In addition, while no SDFs have been directly dated, some paintings associated with them have (Bonneau et al., 2017a, 2017b). These are for the most part shaded polychrome eland antelope which have white underparts, legs, heads and necks with black horns and hooves. Presuming that hoof, horn and white body parts were
Figure 1. Storm Shelter, the type site for ’Significantly Differentiated Figures’ (SDFs) mentioned in the text. ’A’ points towards a Large-Headed SDF; ’B’ points towards the black nose of an eland – directly dated to 2988-2381 cal. BP. Image: David Pearce.
Lesedi #23 | Carnets de terrain | IFAS-Recherche | Novembre 2020
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