[Paper] Ideology, Ritual Performance and Its Manifestations in the Rock Art of Timor-Leste and Kisar Island, Island Southeast Asia

New paper on newly-discovered rock art on Kisar Island, Indonesia by O’Connor et al. published in the Cambridge Archaeology Journal. What’s really interesting in this paper is the fact that the paintings have some similarities with those from East Timor, about 20 km across the sea.

Painted rock art occurs throughout the islands of the Western Pacific and has previously been argued to have motif and design elements in common, indicating that it was created within the context of a shared symbolic system. Here we report five new painted rock-art sites from Kisar Island in eastern Indonesia and investigate the commonalities between this art and the painted art corpus in Timor-Leste, the independent nation that forms the eastern part of the neighbouring island of Timor. We examine the motifs in the Kisar art and suggest that, rather than being Neolithic in age, some of the figurative motifs more likely have a Metal Age origin, which in this region places them within the last 2500 years.

Source: Ideology, Ritual Performance and Its Manifestations in the Rock Art of Timor-Leste and Kisar Island, Island Southeast Asia | Cambridge Archaeological Journal | Cambridge Core

See also

• Indonesian island found to be unusually rich in cave paintings (Eureka Alerts, 15 December 2017)
• In Indonesian Caves, a Treasure Trove of Forgotten Ancient Paintings (Atlas Obscura, 15 December 2017)
• Australian scientists found 2,500 year old cave paintings of dogs in Indonesia (Gizmodo Australia, 14 December 2017)
• Indon art treasures uncovered (Cosmos Magazine, 14 December 2017)
• Unexplored Indonesian island is covered in tiny 2,500-year-old cave paintings (International Business Times, 14 December 2017)
• Rock art north of Timor may link to early Australian human settlement (ABC Radio, 13 December 2017)