Mammoth Spring, Arkansas, portable rock art finds identified by Jeff Vincent include known "face on rhombus" and tabular limestone bird sculpture motifs

 Jeff Vincent find, Mammoth Spring, Arkansas

Jeff has identified several portable rock art sculpture forms at his site in Mammoth Springs, Arkansas. The "face on rhombus" was first described by German Pleistocene rock art pioneer Ursel Benekendorff whose proto-sculpture and sculpture finds from northern Germany date to ca. 475,000 years before present. Jeff's example here likely also exhibits the "one eye open, one eye closed or missing" motif associated with some of the human face mask art objects of the European Lower and Middle Palaeolithic.

Rhomboid stone forms are recurring at many sites in North America where similar kinds of portable rock art objects are also identified, with archaeologists other than Benekendorff also describing them in the "Old World."

Face on rhombus-like flake, 450,000 to 300,000 years before present, The Netherlands

A worked face was also detected on this rhomboid from California and described in an earlier posting on this blog. 

Jeff Vincent holds a typical looking limestone bird sculpture made using a buffer technique on a tabular stone blank to trim away the rock to create the desired profile of a bird. The rhombus and the bird help create a context which supports the likely further productivity of this Arkansas location for additional art and tool finds. Please keep us informed of your finds Jeff.

-kbj