[Skabewis]

By Cristina Silva
Las Vegas, Nevada (AP)

Authorities are offering a $2,500 reward for information about vandals who spray-painted graffiti over prehistoric rock art at the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area in Nevada.

The maroon and blue paint covers pictographs drawn by ancient inhabitants and petroglyphs scraped and ground long ago into rocks at the scenic preserve about 17 miles west of the Las Vegas Strip.

Read More

[AmigoKumeyaay]

Criminals, vandals, idiots, jerks, scumbags!

[wyo_rose]

Here's a link with some pics:
Ancient rock art outside Vegas damaged by graffiti - KTNV ABC,Channel 13,Las Vegas,Nevada,News,Weather,Sports,Entertainment,KTN V.com,Action News .:.

I hope they find them and make them pay.

But the BLM and other agencies need to do more to protect this irreplaceable rock art. Up here, the most accessible sites are protected with fences, gates, and having manned visitor centers right at the sites.

[wyo_rose]

And a news video:
Ancient rock art at Red Rock Canyon damaged by graffiti - My News 3 - KSNV, Las Vegas, NV

[AmigoKumeyaay]

Make this a thread now....

Newsvine - The Killing of Kokopelli

The Killing Of Kokopelli

Fri Nov 12, 2010 5:55 PM EST

Please enjoy this short video excerpt from the Advocacy Films new documentary film, "Solar Gold," in production.
Click the link to view the video: The Killing of Kokopelli on Vimeo. Share this link and spread the word.

Background: In Blythe California, Blythe Solar, a partnership of Chevron and the German firm Solar Millennium will grade and level 9500 acres of desert in an area near to the Blythe Giant Intaglios. These are extremely large geoglyphs (images created on the surface of the Earth) representing Man, Woman, Creator, the seed and the "Trinity," in the Ute Aztecan cosmological view.

The sacred Intaglios are not alone. Filmmakers Robert Lundahl and Robert Gonzales Vasquez have documented scores of geoglyphs in the nearby desert, and local historians indicate the presence of hundreds of figures along the Colorado River extending from Needles, California to Yuma, Arizona and centered in Blythe, California.

Now held in trust by the BLM (Bureau of Land Management), many sacred sites are now under threat of destruction by Chevron, Solar Millenium, Florida Power and Light, Next Era™, and other companies seeking to build mega solar projects under a fast tracked process put in place by the ARRA Recovery Act program. ARRA guarantees government tax credits and rebates in the amount of hundreds of millions of dollars to companies which can put shovel to dirt before the end of 2010.

The video, The Killing of Kokopelli on Vimeo, contains:

1. An interview with former Los Angeles City Planner and La Cuna De Aztlan Sacred Sites Protection Circle member Jim Guerra on, "Why the BLM permits large solar development on native sacred lands".

2. Chemehuevi Tribal Chairman Charles Wood on the nature of sacred lands and their meaning to native peoples, focusing on the giant geoglyphs near Blythe, California.

3. Lowell Bean, Ph.D. Ethnographer and Author, on historical attempts at de-culturalization by the Federal Government, including Indian Boarding Schools, Termination Policies, and Large Solar Development.

4. New documentary footage from the Blythe Spiritual Run, October 30, 2010.

Contact:

Robert Lundahl
415.205.3481,
robert@studio-rla.com

www.advocacyfilms.com
Robert Lundahl - LinkedIn
Robert Lundahl | Facebook
Robert Lundahl on Vimeo
Solana Beach, CA

[AmigoKumeyaay]

Blythe Intaglios - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Topock Maze
The Topock Maze, as it was named, covers 18 acres (73,000 m2) and consists of a series of parallel windrows approximately five feet apart.[3]

A late 19th century unpublished ethnographic report states that the Mojave people used to put some of their men into the center of the maze, leaving them to find their way out without crossing the windrows. Edward Curtis wrote in 1908 that, "It is believed that by running in and out through one of these immense labyrinths, one haunted with a dread [ghost] may bewilder the spirit occasioning it, and thus elude them."

The plaque is weathered and difficult to read. An excerpt is:
"Here, upon this land where you now stand, is the Topock Maze; indeed, a cultural site of much importance to the tribe. To this site the AhaMakav warriors returning home from battle first paused for purification before continuing home."

"Not a true maze, this site is a series of windrows carefully placed in an extensive geometric pattern. Today, the site covers about 10 acres. Evidence suggests that it may have originally been only one section in a group of nearby earth images and features. Sadly, important parts of the complex were destroyed by the construction of the highway. But whether or not the geoglyphs in this vicinity were associated with one another, this was clearly an area of symbolic and ritual significance."

The Google Earth image shows much of the southern half of the maze. The northern half, eight of eighteen acres, is gone. The Atlantic and Pacific railroad bridge took out the heart of the rockwork, which old-timers describe as an anthropomorphic figure with a snake, the man’s feet on the river bank. Interstate 40 construction destroyed more of the maze. Fenced off now against off-road vehicle yahoos, the remaining ten acres sit beneath the roar of jake brakes, the throb of gas compressors from a nearby PG&E facility.

“Maze” is a descriptor assigned by whites. There is no apparent center to this pattern, no obvious labyrinthine path. Explanations of the purpose of the maze are various, even among the Mojave whose land it’s on. It is perhaps about 600 years old. Its original intent has been filtered through generations of hearthside stories since the time of Chaucer.

One must grant the stories of the Hahmakav their rightful precedence over the romantic hypotheses of amateur anthropologists: much of the “lost rock language” of the Southwest, the petroglyphs and pictographs and intaglios whose meanings were thought lost in time, have been deciphered by scientists who followed the unusual expedient of asking the Indians.

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