Item ALB-RSA-LOL1-17.jpg - ALB RSA LOL1 17

Brief description of site: The overhang is 8 m long, between 1.5 m - 1.9 m high and affords good shelter with a rock and sand floor. The shelter faces WNW and has a deeper cavity at its northern and lowest part.

Though close to the river, the deposit in the shelter is dry and more than 0.5 m thick in places. There is very little surface scatter but some crypto-crystalline silicate (opaline) lithics (stone tools) are visible. No bone was visible or pottery or charcoal. No grinding patches were observed.
Brief description of art: Finger dots.

The RSA-LOL1 rock-paintings number approximately 125 individual paintings that extend the length of the shelter. Many of these rock-paintings are of great interest. There are at least 24 eland (Tragelaphus oryx) as well as some smaller antelope and a possible feline. There is also a serpent painted in red with a buck head. Over 40 human figures are painted both in procession and participating in a Medicine or Trance Dance. At least 9 of the human figures wear very nice karoses. A semicircular thick red line encloses part of a small, intimate private healing ceremony depiction - complete with patient, 4 people clapping and 1 healing -. This vignette is notable for its bright and unusual colours - red, light red, yellow and black. . There are also 11 human figures painted in black, 2 of which shoot arrows at each other, though one group of 6 arrows appears to be coming from the wrong side of this 'battle'. There is one large and fat female figure with very thin legs. At least 12 of the human figures are in postures such as bending forward from the waist, holding a hand to their nose and holding their arms behind their back that are diagnostic of the attainment of altered states of consciousness. One of the most interesting panels in the site is located at the juncture between wall and ceiling in the southern end of the shelter:

'Elver' paintings: There are 11 rock-paintings (in groups of 9 and 2) of barrel-chested fish-like creatures that Dr. Paul Skelton of the J.L.B. Smith Institute of Ichthyology has tentatively identified as 'engorged elvers' - baby eels that have eaten too much. These paintings are large with the largest being 310 mm long. They are all painted in an unusual brownish pigment, with some having a black (once white) dorsal line and fin. One 'elver' appears to have 2 sets of 'wings' but these are, in fact, an accidental superimposition on top of the Medicine Dance painted below, that has human figures transforming into winged creatures.

Khoe rock-paintings: Over a distance of over 3.5 m are rows of Khoe herder fingerdots. Interestingly, it is often the case that a row of large, fat fingerdots is accompanied by a parallel row of smaller, more closely-spaced fingerdots.