SEMINAR: ARCHAEOLOGY SEMINAR SERIES

Archaeology is concerned with identifying and interpreting marks, literal and metaphoric, left behind by people past and present. Rock art is one such mark, sub-divided into ‘engravings/petroglyphs’, ‘paintings/pictographs’ and ‘geoglyphs’. But there is also an overlooked and misunderstood category of rock ‘markings’. We call these marks ‘cupules’, ‘cut marks’ and ‘pecks’ to name a few. But these naming are often imprecise – many ‘cut’ marks are ground or abraded rather than incised. There is also a productively messy overlap with ‘utilitarian’ marks such as grindstones. We need to better understand how these marks were made and used. This includes establishing an empirically-rich reference collection and also considering ‘markings’ as agentive and enduring; capable of shedding and acquiring meanings. I use case studies from the eastern Kimberley and southern Africa to argue for the utility of having ‘rock marking’ embedded in our nomenclature.