Brief description of site: The main Site is located on and around the 1281 m, The koppies are remarkable granite formations composed of slab-like and often sharp protuberances that look like huge teeth, and which is located within a varied Bushveld biome. Lesser and larger natural sumps contain water for varying periods. The view from the main site is all-encompassing and other small and large hills appear to rise out of a sea of trees in the wet seasons. The localised landscape is intricate with gullies and alleys.
On the flatter sections and also at the hill's margins there are numerous 'lithics' or stone tools of every description on the surface of the site. These lithics all belong to the Later Stone Age, which covers the period from about 25 000 years ago until historic times. The raw materials used for these lithics are varied. Most are hornfels (also known as lydianite or indurated shale). This raw material is everywhere available in the form of river cobbles. There are also opalines - a crypto-crystalline silicate rock that forms in volcanic pipes and which then occurs either as nodules in rock strata or get washed down streams. Granite fragments appear as if they were tested for stone tools but seem to have been discarded as granite is too coarse-grained and has bad flaking properties. Every stage of stone tool manufacture is present at NAM PTO1. There are cores - large lumps of rock from which stone tools are made. There are flakes - general-purpose cutting tools. Adzes are present and were used for woodworking in much the same way as a spokeshave. End and side-scrapers, often in the shape of a thumbnail were used to prepare leather. There are also rare burins and awls - used to pierce. In addition to the stone tools, there are small pieces of grit-tempered, undecorated pottery fragments. There is also some bone and charcoal and a few metal items of recent vintage. The pottery may belong to herders or early farmers who used the site. The depth of deposit in the shelter is hard to determine because of its size and because of the hard, consolidated earth, but it does exceed 50 cm in places. There are also low stone walls on-site. On the southern side of the site below a panel of engraved ostriches there is a quite substantial set of low (less than 1 m) stone walls. There are numerous flat abraded patches that represent rock on which material such as plant food and possibly ochre was ground fine.
Brief description of art: NAM PTO1's 1 500-plus rock engravings were made by two distinct groups of people. First, there are 'Bushman (also known as 'San') rock engravings that are, broadly speaking, representational within a religious and symbolic framework. Secondly, there are the geometric engravings of Khoekhoen (formerly 'Khoi' or 'Hottentot') herder peoples. Finally, there is a very good example of a 'gong rock' - a naturally occurring granite boulder that has resonant qualities when struck.
Bushman rock engravings: There are many hundreds of pecked outline and pecked infill animals, human figures and others. These engravings are concentrated on the NW and SW of the highest point. The site is dominated by depictions of giraffe, though there are also engraved: a possible antbear; antelope, eland, elephant, felines (leopard?); gemsbok (oryx), a few rare human figures, kudu, ostrich, rhino, zebra. The site has a remarkable western outlier of a huge giraffe engraving that measures 330 cm long - similar to the engraved giraffe of similar size at Beit Bridge, Zimbabwe. There are also engravings of human footprints and animal spoor such as those of giraffe, antelope, rhino and so forth. Most of the engravings have a medium degree of 'patination'. 'Patination' is the degree of weathering the engraved rock has been exposed to. As a general rule, the darker the engraved rock, the older it is; though it must be stressed that local weather conditions and the placement of the engraving on an exposed or sheltered rock can influence matters considerably.
Gong rock: At NAM PTO1 to the east and slightly south of the Trig Beacon, there is what is known as a 'gong rock'. Gong rocks are naturally occurring boulders, usually of dolerite but in this case granite, that are naturally resonant. In other words, these rocks emit a sound like a hammer striking a blacksmith's anvil or tapping a galls of water, when struck with ones hand. These gong rock's resonance is thanks to their being balanced on top of other rocks or having natural cracks through them that act as resonators. The NAM PTO1 gong rock takes the form of a long, lenticular granite slab that rests on other granite. This slab has broken into two parts that measure 204 cm long x 88 cm broad x 27-41 cm thick and 187 cm long x 69 cm broad x 49-70 cm thick. This gong rock has a good tonal range when struck. Please do not strike it with another rock as this causes damage and removes potentially datable patination layers! Rather use a cloth-covered rock or your hand. The places where this gong rock has been struck is shown by 7 small semi-hemisperical hollows known as 'cupules' measuring between 29 mm - 60.5 mm in diameter and 2.5 mm - 9 mm in depth.
Cupules: On a large flat rock to the west are a number of cupules that are not the result of percussive hammering to produce sound like on a gong rock. Measuring between 32.5 mm - 88 mm and 10 mm - 24 mm depth, these 7 cupules are too small and on too sloping a surface to have been used as grinding hollows such as occur elsewhere nearby. Also, these cupules occur as the centre point of an engraved encircling line. This 'motif' is often referred to as a 'cup-and-ring' mark and occurs in many parts of the world.
Khoekhoen rock engravings: NAM PTO1 has a great many non-representational geometric engravings that consist of circles, wavy lines, grid and star-like forms. At times, these geometric motifs bear a striking resemblance to the grid-like patterns found in the bodies of the giraffe engravings. Previously thought to represent the 'entoptic phenomena' or visual hallucinations experienced by trancing Bushman shamans, these geometric are better understood as being the product of Khoekhoen herder peoples that moved into Namibia between 2 000 - 2 500 years ago.