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Camp > Destinations > Utah > Parowan Gap >  Rock Art

A Parowan Gap pictograph.Parowan Gap

Rock Art

This page contains a discussion of the rock art found along the Parowan Gap, north of Cedar City, Utah. All photographs are from 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.


There are a good number of rock art panels all along the west Gap, on both sides of the road. Most are on the north side, but watch among the boulders and higher faces on the south side as well.

There are not many anthropomorphic nor zoomorphic figures here, but there are a great number of "calendar" types of markings, and what appear to be images of the Sun. This is definitely an area where the natives were counting something. I believe all of these images are petroglyphs.


The panel to the right is on the north side of the road, near the east end of the Gap, appears to show a snake-like object as the most prominent feature, with a variety of circles and other cut markings. The surfaces in this area are covered with many small markings, some more abstract than others.


The panel below is the main panel within The Gap. It is on the north side, near the eastern entrance. It is behind the fence, and is several feet above the level of the road. This is the largest panel within the area, and there are markings all over the surrounding rock faces.

I have seen some literature that assumes that the V shaped feature with the bulbous bottom is some sort of a solar calendar, and they relate this panel to the main panel at Rochester Canyon on the west edge of the San Rafael Swell.

One of the more interesting images found within this group can be seen in the upper portion of this image, just to the left of the mid point. It reminds me of modern "crop circles." There is even a little humanoid figure ("space alien") to the left of it.

Parowan Gap petroglyphs, near Parowan, Utah.

Parowan Gap petroglyphs, near Parowan, Utah.


This panel is on the north side of the road, at the east end of the Gap.
It's most prominent features are the humanoid figure in the upper right corner, and the graphic just above it that looks like something one would expect from a more modern Native American group, such as the Navajo. There is a figure in the lower right that might be an atl-atl, but most of the other markings are more difficult to interpret.
Parowan Gap petroglyphs, near Parowan, Utah.

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.

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