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8 Rock Art of the Dominican Republic and Caribbean Adolfo López Belando, with contributions by Michele H. Hayward Translation by Michele H. Hayward Introduction The Dominican Republic possesses over 500 rock art sites, a number that continues to grow,as even the recent official registry of 453 locations inTable 7.1 of the previous chapter in this volume demonstrates.The relatively short tradition of Dominican rock art investigations, coupled with substantial unexplored areas, means that it is still possible to be the first to experience the wonder and magnificence of this rich body of past cultural expression. While we know that the carving and painting of images on rock surfaces came to an abrupt end with the arrival of the Spanish to Hispaniola some 500 years ago, we are less certain of when these activities began.Their execution may have followed shortly after the arrival of populations to the island during the Lithic and Archaic ages, around 4000 b.c. (Hayward, Atkinson, and Cinquino, Introduction, this volume). Early Spanish chroniclers of the contact-period Taíno describe an involved religious belief system in which caves played special roles as sacred places. Fray Ramón Pané (1974:31) is quoted in the previous chapter as stating that the inhabitants “painted” their caves. Pedro Mártir de Anglería (1979:194), an early compiler of observations of the Taíno culture, reports that “[t]hey visit caves as on a pilgrimage, as we do when we go to Rome or the Vatican, the seat of our religion” (translation by Michele H. Hayward). Cemís, made of stone,clay,wood,or cloth,might also be kept there.This class of supernatural beings was considered to possess magical powers and could be invoked for favors and protection (Hayward,Atkinson, and Cinquino, Introduction , this volume;Rouse 1992:14, 118–119). Early reports also suggest that communion or contact with spiritual beings was achieved with the aid of a local hallucinogenic. Cohoba was inhaled through a tube to achieve altered states of consciousness (Hayward,Atkinson, and Cinquino,Introduction,this volume;Rouse 1992:14,118–119) in which Rock Art of the Dominican Republic and Caribbean / 103 visions of the supernatural world were conceived and dialog took place with the spirits. It may be that much of pre-Hispanic rock art production was strongly influenced by this ritual. Many of the present images may prove to have been inspired by thoughts and actions experienced by the human participant during these altered states. Whatever the motivating source,the pictographs in particular possess certain differences in painting style and distribution that I have employed to define discrete or formal schools. This scheme, developed over many years of inspections of Dominican and other Caribbean rock art, intimately interconnects with the history of cultural groups on Hispaniola, as well as other islands (López Belando 1993,2004,2005),even though we as yet do not fully understand the character or details of this intertwining. This classificatory approach has been employed by other investigators in the Dominican Republic such as José Gabriel Atiles Bidó (see Chapter 7, this volume). Nonetheless ,what follows represents my view of the nature of rock art in past Dominican and Caribbean societies. Dominican Pictograph Schools As implied above, dissimilarities in execution, iconography, composition, and location that separate the pictograph schools are assumed to relate to the different cultural groups on the island. I recognize three pictograph schools. The José María school’s primary locations are in the southeast of the country, at the Parque Nacional del Este and the nearby Cueva de las Maravillas, La Altagracia Province.The Borbón school represents the most expansive style, named after the first caves with this type of pictographs discovered in the nineteenth century.The Berna school is currently found in only three caves in the Dominican Republic, one of them located in La Altagracia Province and the other two in Pedernales Province (López Belando 2007:139–140). José María Pictograph School The Parque Nacional del Este’s Cueva José María, with its presently inventoried 1,200 pictographs, stands out as the premier type-site of this school. The images immediately impress one with their vibrancy and may contain numerical,calendrical,and cosmological references,among other themes (Figure 8.1). The originality of the painted depictions makes them unique and pivotal to the understanding of Caribbean rock art development, and they may well play a similar role from a wider perspective (López Belando 2007...

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