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Introduction No book has speci¤cally addressed the rock-art of eastern North America, other than the collection of papers from our 1993 Eastern States Rock Art Conference (Faulkner 1996). Before that solitary publication, there was virtually no overview in the literature that focused solely on the petroglyphs and pictographs of eastern North America. Overviews of North American rock-art by Campbell Grant (1992 [1967]) and Klaus Wellmann (1979) included information on sites located in the Eastern Woodlands. Grant’s Rock Art of the American Indian gave an overview of rock-art in North America and Canada. Wellmann’s later book offered additional data and discussion, and his photographs represented many more sites, including excellent coverage of those in the eastern regions. Along with a modicum of sporadic reports , these two books served, for decades, as the major sources of data from which researchers working in the east could glean information. With regard to major publications focusing on rock-art surveys of eastern states, these began in 1984 with Swauger’s publication on Ohio, followed by Coy et al.’s (1997) Kentucky survey, Diaz-Granados and Duncan’s (2000) book on Missouri , and, most recently, Lenik’s (2002) book covering a selection of northeastern states. There is no question that more rock-art exists in the western half of North America than in the eastern half. The reasons for this are easy to understand. First is the climate. The climate in the western half of our continent is dry— arid in some regions—so rock carvings and paintings have a much better chance for survival. Rock carvings in the west expose a lighter matrix against their darker rock surface. This sharp contrast persists for centuries, making the designs comparatively easy to see. In the Eastern Woodlands, rock carvings repatinate rapidly—within years—and both the carvings and cortex assume the same color, that of the surface. The reason for this is that the eastern half of our continent deals with humidity, heavy rains, and sometimes serious®ooding. Evidence of unstable weather patterns can be traced back for millennia . A second, more recent, factor is acid rain. One would think that the eastern pictographs and petroglyphs do not have a chance for survival. Actually , they don’t! Those in exposed contexts such as on boulders, bluff tops, and facades are doomed to extinction. Over the past two decades, we have noted that some sites have already disappeared. Others are barely visible. The rate of deterioration depends, of course, on location and environment. It is dif¤cult to know the actual number of sites that have already vanished, but judging from the degrees of faded pictographs and partial petroglyphs, the number appears to be substantial. The deterioration of these sites is obviously exacerbating with continuing climate changes. For the past several years, there has been a growing awareness of, and urgency to study, eastern rock-art. This is, in part, because of the recognition of the inherent value of rock-art as iconographic information. Thus, a third segment of the equation is the increasing visitation through a heightened awareness of this ancient, sacred imagery on boulders and bluffs and in caves and rockshelters in the eastern portion of our continent. As recently as 20 years ago very little was being done other than a few scattered site reports and partial surveys. There has been a marked increase in the number of petroglyph and pictograph sites being identi¤ed and documented as professionals and avocationals alike become more cognizant of the urgency to save these data before they disappear. For example, in 1967, Grant (1992) showed no sites in Indiana, and in the past 15 years, a few have been discovered (Cochran and Wepler 1994; Redmond and Koehler 1996). The number of sites reported in Missouri doubled with the 1993 statewide survey (Diaz-Granados 1993), and new sites have been found in Kentucky (Boedy, Coy et al., Ison), Tennessee (Cressler , Faulkner, Simek), Alabama (Allan, Henson, Simek), South Carolina (Charles), Illinois (McCorvie, Swedlund, Wagner), Pennsylvania (Nevin), and the Northeast in general (Hedden, Lenik, Swauger), but not all sites have yet been published. The Rock-Art of Eastern North America delivers to the reader a window into the research taking place in this long-neglected region. It is a region with American Indian rock-art imagery that is understandably more precious because of its scarceness and endangered state as a result of exposure to the elements and vandalism. This inaugural volume covers rock-art research...

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