Post by Jerry Thornton on Sept 8, 2007 17:34:39 GMT -5
Petroglyph // Pictograph
Do you have a favorite?
Do you have a favorite?
Most every visitor to Nine Mile Canyon has picked out a favorite petroglyph or pictograph. Bo Dalton, NCMSA board member, especially likes the “Dirty Ho Buffalo” petroglyph. Bo thinks the simple line presentation on a clear desert varnish surface is most expressive.
He calls this petroglyph, Dirty Ho Buffalo, after hearing stories of the adjacent canyon which doesn’t have a name, but cowboys with a strong sentiment about it, named the trail from the canyon floor to Cowboy Bench “sleepers Trail”. This canyon (and trail) is on the north side where the road splits to go up Cottonwood Canyon.
Coming down the canyon, approaching Cottonwood, the creek swings close to the road and ledge. Three quarters a mile past mile marker 44 you see some painting on a pale tan ledge. There are faint blue, red and white lines, sort of like a rainbow, with anthropomorphic* figures. Just beyond this is a smooth light brown ledge that boasts the “Dirty Ho Buffalo” with a humanoid figure, a buffalo, in Bo’s assumption, and other objects.
*anthropomorphic: attributing of human shape or characteristics to a god, animal, or inanimate thing.