Includes information on protected rock art sites in Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah. Gives information on these special rock art areas: Albuquerque and Santa Fe Area; Arches National Park; Bandelier National Monument Area; Canyon de Chelly National Monument; Canyonlands National Park--Maze Area; Canyonlands National Park--Needles Area; Capitol Reef National Park;Central Utah Area; Chaco Canyon Area; Desolation-Gray Canyon of the Green River; Grand Canyon National Park; Grand Gulch Primitive Area;Hovenweep National Monument; Indian Creek Canyon; Moab Area; Petrified Forest National Park; San Juan River Gorge; Three Rivers Area; Uintah Basin Area; West-Central Colorado Area; Zuñi-Cibola Area; miscellaneous areas; and Anasazi celestial rock art.

An illustrated guide to understanding the prehistoric Indian cultures of the general Four Corners region, with sections listing sites where the remnants of these cultures can be viewed.

The rich photography and narrative in this book presents an overview of approximately 5,000 years of Native American rock art painted and engraved on the canyon walls and boulders within the greater Grand Canyon region, an area stretching south from the Arizona-Utah border to the Mogollon Rim. The authors and their associates have recorded and documented more than 450 rock art sites within the region over the past 25 years in cooperation with the Kaibab National Forest, Grand Canyon National Park, Bureau of Land Management/Arizona Strip, and the Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument. Their work presents a preliminary classification of this rock art within a chronological framework and associated cultural affiliations. These enigmatic images are placed within their environmental and archaeological context, essential in deriving potential clues as to their function and significance. Several interpretation theories exist in the literature and these are carefully examined in light of this current research. Importantly, rock art is an endangered cultural heritage and the question of its protection, preservation, and conservation also receives attention. While rock art offers a view into one aspect of the prehistoric cultural landscape, the religious and social importance of these images continues to have relevance to contemporary Native American peoples as well as representing an engaging cultural legacy for all humanity.

Prehistoric rock art is the markings - paintings, engravings, or pecked images - left on rocks or cave walls by ancient peoples. In this book, Paul G. Bahn provides a richly illustrated overview of prehistoric rock art and cave art from around the world. Summarizing the recent advances in our understanding of this extraordinary visual record, he discusses new discoveries, new approaches to recording and interpretation, and current problems in conservation. Bahn focuses in particular on current issues in the interpretation of rock art, notably the "shamanic" interpretation that has been influential in recent years and that he refutes. This book is based on the Rhind Lectures that the author delivered for the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland in 2006.

With the exception of the Grand Canyon itself, none of the great gorges of the American Southwest is more uniquely beautiful than Canyon de Chelly, with its sheer red cliffs and innumerable prehistoric Indian dwellings. Of all the important centers of prehistoric Anasazi culture, only this magnificent canyon shows an unbroken record of settlement for more than 1,000 years. In this liberally illustrated book, rock art authority Campbell Grant examines four aspects of the spectacular canyon: its physical characteristics, its history of human habitation, its explorers and archaeologists, and its countless rock paintings and petroglyphs. Grant surveys 96 sites in the two main canyons and offers an interpretation of the rock art found there.