La Cieneguilla Petroglyph Site: Rock Art

A cairn found in Cohab Canyon, Capitol Reef National Park.

Frank and Anne's Canyon Country Hiking and Camping Notebook.

La Cieneguilla Petroglyph Site

Campsite

Ancient Ruins
and Rock Art

Petroglyph from the La Cieneguilla Petroglyph Site in New Mexico.

This page contains a discussion of the rock art found at the La Cieneguilla Petroglyph Site in New Mexico. All photographs are from our our personal collection. If you'd like to see more rock art from this location, or if you'd like to see higher resolution or larger images, send us an e-mail message and we'll see what we can do.

Rock Art

Though the rock art panels at La Cieneguilla have existed for hundreds or thousands of years, the location as only recently been opened to the public and is still mostly unknown. We had only limited time to visit the site, so have only explored about half of the petroglyphs available for viewing. It's an exciting site with a variety of Rio Grande Style images. It also has many unique drawings that are striking when viewed in person. As usual, photos can only give a rough idea of what the piece would be like when viewed live.

For more information on how to preserve and protect these priceless historic treasures:

See American Antiquities Act of 1906.
See Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979.
Archaeological Resources Protection Act Hotline: 800-227-7286.
See Archaeological Site Etiquette

The main image at the top of this page shows what looks to be a design from a blanket or piece of pottery. It has a bird, possibly a parrot, emerging from its top, with a tilted cross. This image was almost hidden behind a large rock, at ground level. It might be missed if viewed from the wrong angle.

The image above is quite unusual in that it seems to have incorporated a natural break in the volcanic rock face into the design. It appears that the image if of a mouth, with sharp teeth protruding from its edges. There is also the zoomorphic image that looks to be some sort of a bird, perhaps approaching too close for its own safety.

One of the things that we noticed at this location was the large number of Kokopelli figures, which tend to be associated with fertility. There are several pregnant female images, as well as copulation scenes similar to the one depicted here. The upper figure is definitely a female anthropomorph, with the prone Kokopelli perhaps fertilizing her through the use of his flute.

Though there are several "stacked" parrot images at this location, this image looks more like a corn stalk. Again, this would fit in with the fertility theme of many of the images on this large run of petroglyph panels.

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More Rock Art

All of these photos have been resized and manipulated in Photoshop to give the best representation of the image. Some color distortion is inevitable. If you would like to see higher quality versions of these shots, or if you would like to use these images for any purpose, please contact us and we would be glad to help if we can.

Anthropomorphs
Armless Figure with Square Chest Copulation Scene Face on Edge Face with Hat and Bird Face with One Feather Face with Triangular Body Female Figure Eight Body with Long Neck and Head Figure Lying with Snake Hand In Gunslinger Stance Male Figure Obscure Figure with Rings Several Male Figures Three Foot Prints Two Figures With Arms and Legs Wide	With Bird Head With Hollow body and Tail With Horns and Waving Hand With Horns on Head With Jar on Head With Objects in Hands With Pronghorn Head With Raised Arms and Headdress With Round Body and Long Arms With Round Body and Raised Arms With Round Head, Square Body, One Arm With Solid Body and Upraised Arms With Thick Body and Raised Arms With Thick Legs and Droopy Ears With Two Feathers White Figure
Geometric Designs
Candelabra Circle Circle with Inner Teeth Circles and Spiral Cross with Circle at Bottom Cross with Unidentifiable Object Dagger Geometric Designs with Toad Geometric Design 1 Geometric Design 2 Geometric Design 3 Geometric Design 4 Geometric Designs Geometric Lines with Anthropomorphs	Horned Owl-like Image Kokopelli with Snakes Lamp with Shade Letter H Loose Spiral Owl-like Image Plant Image Shield with Circle Spiral 1 Spiral 2 Spiral with Central Pit Spiral with Rod Through Middle Two Headed Object, with Lower Horns Wavy Horizontal Line
Kokopellis
Facing Left 1 Facing Left 2 Facing Right 1 Facing Right 2 Facing Right 3 Facing Right 4 Fertilizing Female Anthropomorph 1 Fertilizing Female Anthropomorph 2	Five in a Row Lying on Back Sitting Two Facing Left With Female Anthropomorph With Large Head Piece With Snake and Anthropomorph Without Flute
Panels
Birds, Spiral, and More Dumbbell with Birds Geometric Designs and Zoomorphs Hands and Birds Long-necked Zoomorph with Hand Mixed Panel 1 Mixed Panel 2 Mixed Panel 3	Spiral with Anthropomorph Spirals and Hand Spirals and Other Objects Two Abstract Figures Two Bats and a Spiral Zoomorph and Kokopelli Zoomorph and Spirals
Zoomorphs
Bat Beaver Pelt 1 Beaver Pelt 2 Bird 1 Bird 2 Bird 3 Bird 4 Bird and Coyote Bird with Eye Socket Bird with Long Bill Bird with Long Tail Feathers Coyote Coyote and Deer Coyote and Frog Dog-like Figure Dragonfly Fish Five Birds on a Stick, Plus One Four Birds on a Stick with a Plume Frog 1 Frog 2 Lizard 1 Lizard 2 Lizard 3 Lizard 4 Lizard 5 Lizard 6 Long-necked Bird Parrot Pigeon Plumed Bird with Others Pterodactyl-like Figure Rabbit with Long Tail	Ring-tailed Cat Running Dog Several Zoomorphs 1 Several Zoomorphs 2 Shore Bird Small Mammal 1 Snake Swallow Three Birds Three Birds on a Stick Thunderbird 1 Thunderbird 2 Thunderbird 3 Thunderbird 4 Thunderbird 5 Thunderbird with Another Bird Thunderbird with Anthropomorph Thunderbird with Other Objects Tropical Bird 1 Tropical Bird 2 Two Birds Two Birds with Another Object Two Parrots Two Tropical Birds on a Branch, with Another Two Zoomorphs Unidentifiable Figure 1 Unidentifiable Figure 2 Unidentifiable Figure 3 Unidentifiable Zoomorph 1 Unidentifiable Zoomorph 2 Unidentifiable Zoomorph 3 Variety of Zoomorphs

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This page was last updated Monday, July 14, 2008

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