In an age of jet planes and bullet trains, the thousands of years early Homo sapiens trekked seems inconceivable and extremely complex. Memories of where they had lived before moving on, probably because of climate change, and sometimes taking in their cells other homonid's DNA, were processed by the mind's imaginative skills and stored as dreams, re-emerging, slowly, as myths.

In historic times, several generations lived in the same place. They knew the plants, trees, birds, sounds smells....streets, buildings, shopping malls. Returning from a journey, home was still "recognizably the same."

As rock art is solidly in place, unlike most other art it can't be bought and displayed in museums. Still, it is "reclassified in the modern system as primitive art or cultural artifact," assigning it a place in science's taxonomy. With many archaeologists now opining that at least a portion of it was made by shamans, it is also being stripped of its numinous power. In fact, even measuring, quantifying, and photographing are forms of spiritual vandalism.

These are harsh words, especially directed at those whom I respect, and whose work helps protect rock art sites threatened by private and corporate hegemony. They are written in defense of the mystery, power and depth of the indigenous soul's engagement with the earth. As our journey continues toward a "posthuman" detachment from the planet's ecology, perhaps even over the cliff of sustainability, we may need aboriginal wisdom as never before.

"'I want to stay here in the rocks,'
Said Mountain Sheep.
'I like to feel the ground,' Rock said,
'I like to stay here in one place and not move.'