On the Back of a Blue Elk

Recent Ethnohistorical Sources and ‘Ambiguous’ Stone Age Rock Art at Pyhänpää, Central Finland

Bibliographic Data

ID6095124
AuthorsAntti Lahelma (0000-0003-3879-4195, University of Helsinki, corresponding author)
Year2007
Volume40
Issue2
Pages113-137
Publication date2007-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueNorwegian Archaeological Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0029-3652 • E-ISSN: 1502-7678
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00293650701708875
OpenAlexW1964226386
LanguageEN
Citations received27
References cited28

Three groups of motifs – cervids, boats and human figures – dominate North European hunter‐gatherer rock art. The scarcity of explicit narrative scenes makes the interpretation of this art a very difficult task, but important clues can be found in a group of ‘ambiguous’ images, where the said three categories are combined in ‘unrealistic’ ways. In this paper, the prospect of an ethnographically informed approach to their interpretation is explored, using as a case study the rock painting of Pyhänpää (Central Finland) and ethnographic material drawn chiefly from Saami religion and traditional Finnish epic poetry. It is argued that the ambiguous imagery of rock art has a clear counterpart in the pre‐Christian religious tradition, where cervids and boats have a similarly ambiguous nature. The painting, which shows an elk, a boat and a human figure merged together, is interpreted as representing the shamanic flight and the sense of co‐essence between the shaman and his spirit helper beings. The making of the painting is associated with the belief that such beings lived inside specific rock cliffs and that their power could be obtained through visits to rock art sites

Aesthetics · Archaeology · Art · Art history · EPIC · Ethnography · Interpretation (philosophy) · Linguistics · Literature · Narrative · Painting · Poetry · Rock art · Shamanism · Sociology · Anthropology · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Archaeology and Rock Art Studies · History · Philosophy · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology

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