Ancient Anasazi petroglyphs lie amidst suburban sprawl
Submitted by coldrum on Thursday, 03 January 2008 Page Views: 1914
Rock ArtCountry: United States Type: Rock ArtInternal Links:
An ancient 40-ton jungle gym of sorts, the massive burnt umber boulder anchors a neighborhood park and beckons suburban kids to clamber over its mysterious Anasazi etchings. And climb aboard they do, sometimes even attempting to scratch their own marks before the adults run them
off, neighbors say.
Archaeologists typically warn against even smudging natural skin oils on the chiseled drawings or the rock's natural mineral glaze so they won't slowly melt away. "I've climbed on it," acknowledged Melissa Cornwall, whose in-laws live next to backyard-sized Petroglyph Park in the city's Bloomington subdivision, near the meeting place of southern Utah's Great Basin and the Mojave Desert (USA).
The state's fastest-growing cities are gobbling up millennium- old rock art. "This is our past. It's like our library," said Dorena Martineau, cultural resources director for the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah. Homebuilders long have surrounded or even dynamited the desert boulders that tell the old tales. Martineau's late father photographed and interpreted countless rocks before two Washington County dams flooded the area. Now housing developers are capitalizing on and marketing petroglyph parks that give subdivisions a distinction but inevitably suck some of the soul out of sacred landscapes.
Read more at SHNS.
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