The Gherbescina painted shelters (Ennedi, Chad) (original) (raw)
Related papers
Les Cahiers de l'AARS 19, 2017
Abstract : During four visits to the Tasīli of Tamrit (east of Djanet) and the Taġelahin and Ăharhar Tasset regions (west of the oasis of Iherir) between 2011 and 2016, the author had the opportunity to visit all principal rock-art localities in the area. Processing the taken digital photographs with DStretch®, plug-in of ImageJ developed by Jon Harman, it was possible to discern elephant hunt scenes at four well known localities which have not been published by previous authors.
Idiosyncratic paintings from a distant past in Sivré I (Ennedi, Chad)
EXPRESSION N°31, 2021
Despite the variety of motifs documented in the Ennedi rock art tradition, dating from the mid-Ho- locene to the present day, representations of fantastic entities seem extremely rare. The pre-Islamic beliefs in an impersonal creator god and ancestor worship (Fuchs 1961; Tubiana 1964), along with an overt veneration for cattle, explain the rock art’s secular ap- pearance, referred to as the pastoral period (Menardi Noguera 2018). The much older paintings from the pre-pastoral peri- od (the archaic period in the local rock-art terminol- ogy (Bailloud, 1997)), include representations of hu- mans and a selection of African fauna, exceptionally extended to the aquatic realm (Gauthier and Gauthier 2019). At first glance, this ancient art seems primari- ly motivated by interest or fear. The represented ani- mals are the best possible game, like the elephants and giraffes, or the most dangerous, like the big cats, as expected from ecological studies of ancient and con- temporaneous hunter-gatherers’ behavior (Halfon and Barkai 2020, Bugir et al. 2021).
The Chéïré-1 painted shelter (Ennedi, Chad)
Zenodo
Chéïré-1 is a large painted shelter located in the SW sector of the Ennedi, east of the renewed Wadi Archeï guelta, particularly rich with fine paintings portraying the cattle herders who inhabited the region during the early Iron Age. Chéïré-1 was discovered during the 1997 winter by Andrea Bonomo. Revisited in March 2014, the site was fully documented using cross-polarized flash lights, a basic photographic technique first introduced in rock art studies by Henderson (2002). In all, 485 motifs have been referenced and indexed after image enhancement by D-Stretch (Harman, 2002). Chéïré-1 est un grand abri peint situé dans le secteur sud-ouest de l'Ennedi, à l'est de la célèbre guelta du Wadi Archeï, particulièrement riche de belles peintures dépeignant les éleveurs de bétail qui ont habité la région dans la premier âge du fer.
The painted shelter of Baradergolo I revisited (Ennedi Chad)
2022
The rock art site of Baradergolo I is home to many paintings, recorded mainly by direct tracing in 1957. A new digital photographic survey of the entire site has confirmed the excellent quality of these historical reproductions, revealing further details and completing the inventory of existing paintings, most of which date from the Final Cattle and Ancient Camel periods. The earliest paintings consist of a few faded paintings from the early pastoral or archaic periods and a single Hohou style figure.
In this article we remember Norbert by writing about elephant images from the Cederberg region, in a way that we think he would have appreciated. We believe that San artists embody and display a deep understanding of animal ecology and behaviour. There are over 200 shelters in the Cederberg which have reference to paintings of elephants. We have visited 50 of these shelters and have recorded total of 230 elephant tracings which have been compared with the images of African Elephants. The original research methods used by Norbert Aujoulat were an inspiration for this study. The comparison of the above tracings and photographs reveal a remarkable degree of realism in the art of the San. To try and get a better understanding as to why elephants were the chosen subject matter of the San artists, we embarked on a program to study the compositions of the various paintings, focusing on the painted San figures, the deliberately painted lines, and the handprints that surround the elephants, and while doing so, we studied the characteristics and behaviour of elephants simultaneously with research into known San behaviour, ethnology, mythology and folklore. Our conclusion is that the symbolic art work of the San painters should be regarded as thoroughly practical in effect. Résumé : Observer et peindre les éléphants : l'art pariétal San de la région du Cederberg (Afrique du Sud). Nous voulons rendre ici un hommage à Norbert Aujoulat en commentatnt d'une manière qu'il aurait appréciée des représentations pariétales d'éléphants de la région du Cedergerg. Nous pensons que les artistes San ont intégré et affiché une profonde compréhension de l'écologie et du comportement des animaux. Il y a plus de 230 abris dans le Cederberg présentant des peintures d'éléphants. Un total de 95 tracés d'éléphants de différentes compositions a été comparé avec les images de l'éléphant d'Afrique. Les méthodes originales utilisées par Norbert Aujoulat ont été une source d'inspiration pour cette étude. La comparaison des tracés et des photos ci-dessous révèlent un remarquable degré de réalisme dans l'art San. Pour essayer de mieux comprendre les raisons pour lesquelles les éléphants furent le thème choisi par les artistes San, nous avons entrepris une étude de la composition des différents tableaux, orientée plus particulièrement sur les silhouettes San peintes et les lignes et empreintes de mains entourant délibérément les éléphants. Parallèlement, nous avons étudié les caractéristiques et le comportement des éléphants en même temps que nous avons développé une recherche sur le comportement, l'ethnologie, la mythologie et le folklore San. Notre conclusion est que l'oeuvre d'art symbolique des peintres San doit être considérée comme essentiellement pragmatique.
Elephant Ranges in Ancient Sudan. Reevaluating the Narrative of the Meroitic War Elephant
Der Antike Sudan. Mitteilungen der Sudanarchäologischen Gesellschaft zu Berlin 35, 2024
The article challenges the narrative of a Meroitic war elephant tradition, which is based on the assumption that elephants were widespread in the Meroitic Empire. To address this, the study examines the historical distribution of elephants in the Middle Nile Valley to better understand their actual habitats. Archaeozoological, visual, and textual sources are analyzed to provide a more nuanced picture of elephant distribution. In addition to these sources, the investigation also considers ecological and anthropogenic factors that likely influenced the presence of these animals. The study reveals that previously reported claims about elephant distribution need to be revised. The findings suggest that, according to the sources, elephants were only present in the peripheral areas of the Meroitic Empire and likely entered the Meroitic heartland only seasonally and sporadically.
The lost archaic paintings of Sivré IV (Ennedi, Chad)
Zenodo, 2017
The Sivré hill in the Ennedi, well-known for the two “Martians” discovered by Gérard Bailloud in 1957, hosts in its shelters some paintings attributable to the pre-pastoral period, not surveyed at the time of the first reporting but only mentioned. In particular, the overlooked weathered paintings present in two secluded shelters southwest of Sivré IV, show that the site is richer of a diverse pre-pastoral art than it was possible to imagine from the previously published descriptions. The superimposition relations among these ancient paintings are consistent with the relative regional chronology proposed for the oldest painting styles in the Ennedi.
The Painted Shelters of Korien Hardanga (Ennedi, Chad)
Les Cahiers de l’AARS , 2021
The southern slope of the Gribi Hill hosts a vast complex of eleven rock art sites. Korien Hardanga III, the largest cave in the hill, counts hundreds of painted human figures, mainly painted in the Fada style. Superimpositions of progressively more stylised figures added during the time without an apparent narrative intent suggest that the primary motivation for decorating the contiguous sites of Korien Hardanga lay in the desire to preserve the memory of the individual and collective identity.