New rock-art data from the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil: A graphical analysis of rock-art shelters between the Vermelho and Gavião rivers

Abstract

Since the 1980s, a French-Brazilian archaeological mission has studied the economic, social, cultural and symbolic dimensions of the oldest prehistoric settlements found to date in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso. The ongoing examination of these habitats, settlements and rock-art sites seeks to better understand the territories and cultures of the precolonial groups who inhabited the southernmost part of Mato Grosso.In the course of these decades, systematic prospections in the region of the Vermelho River uncovered over a hundred sites decorated with both figurative and non-figurative paintings, drawings and carvings that depict images such as animals, humans and signs.This article analyzes the most recent discoveries of rock-art sites identified on the banks of the Vermelho and Gavião rivers. It contextualizes the region and the researches undertaken in its territory, and outlines the previous approaches and the methodology adopted at its rock-art sites. It then describes these rock-art sites and discusses the originality and the symbolic continuity of the marks left by precolonial groups in their landscape.