South African Archaeological Society

Famous Rock-Paintings in the KarooAuthor(s): A. R. WillcoxSource: The South African Archaeological Bulletin, Vol. 14, No. 54 (Jun., 1959), p. 56Published by: South African Archaeological SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3886637 .

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FAMOUS ROCK-PAINTINGS IN THE KAROO

A. R. WILLCOX

In the course of a recent archaeological tour of the Cape Province, with the aid of an expenses grant from C.S.I.R., one of the sites sought out and photographed was a cave on the farm Ezeljacht in the Longkloof between George and Oudtshoorn. This site is inter- esting not only for its unusual rock-paintings but also because, with the exception of some crude petroglyphs from an unknown site reproduced in this Bulletin,' these were the first South African rock-drawings to be copied and reproduced (1837). The Ezeljacht shelter was also visited and copied by Miss Wilman in 1907 and her copy reproduced with an editorial note in this journal.2

Since Miss Willman's visit another fifty-two years have elapsed making a total of a century and a quarter since Major C. C. Mitchell made the copy reproduced in Sir James Alexander's book,3 so it was interesting to compare the present state of the paintings with the reproduction of which we were told by Alexander, 'The colour of the drawings is precisely that repre- sented in the engravings'. The deterioration was found to be imperceptible. It must be remembered though that the colour (Venetian red) is probably the most durable of Bushman paints, that the paintings are in a well-protected position in a cave of Table Mountain Sandstone, and that the Karoo climate is exceptionally dry. The photograph gives a fair idea of the clarity of the paintings.

The creatures represented, fish-like up to the waist with fluked tails, and human above, may have a common origin with the mermaid of European folk- lore in the marine mammal, the dugong or manatee of the Indian Ocean.

REFERENCES

IMacfarlane, D. R. 'An Early Copyist of Bushman Drawings', S. Af. Archaeol. Bull., IX, 34. 2 S. Af. Archaeol. Bull., 1I, 7.

A Narrative of a Voyage of Exploration among the Colonies of Western Africa. London, vol. 2, plate 111. 1837.

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POINTS FROM CORRESPONDENCE

In his 'Notes on the Zimbabwe-Sofala Problem' (S. Af. Archaeol. Bull., March 1959) Mr. R. Mauny questions the accuracy of the C14 dating of two fragments of wood found in a drain in the masonry at Zimbabwe. It will be recalled that the assays gave a dating of between A.D. 500 and A.D. 800, which Mr. Mauny considers far too ancient. He postulates the possibility of the wood having been impregnated with radioactivity in assimilating moisture from the soil in a region where the local granites are radioactive. Assuming this is so and that the wood can have been contaminated by radioactivity derived ultimately

from the granite and that this increase in radioactivity would have been recorded on converting the wood to gas surely the resulting date would have been far too young instead of too old. In existing organic matter the C14: C"2 ratio is so small (1012:1) that the slightest amount of extraneous radioactivity would be sufficient to falsify the dating of archaeological organic material, but in the opposite direction to that imagined by Mr. Mauny.

J. Davies 91 Emm Lane,

Bradford 9, England.

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