Skirbeek II 73 MT

• Tshirundu

Brief description of site: Cupule Cave is less than 2 km from RSA TSH1. The site is a 5.5m wide, 6.8 m deep and between 1.4 m - 1.8 m high ocular or eye-shaped cave. Within the cave there is an inner aperture or opening to the outside in the wall. The has up to 200 mm of archaeological deposit on top of a rock floor. There are many small rocks and stone on and in this archaeological deposit. The landscape beyond the cave is flat and the cave is relatively hidden and private. The cave faces South.

There are very few lithics (stone tools) in the cave and very few on the apron outside the cave. There is no bone preserved and no ostrich eggshell was observed. There is little in the way of archaeological deposit. 60 m to the west is RSA TSH3 but the relationship between the two sites is not clear.
Brief description of art: RSA TSH2 contains both Khoe finger-paintings as well as 394 enigmatic 'cupules', an engraved groove and an engraved antelope spoor.

Khoe finger-paintings: On the ceiling of the cave are white finger-painted lines in groups of 3, 4 and 5. These lines extend up to 340 mm in length. The pigment is very thick and granular - like a clay.

2Cupules: Cupules are an enigmatic form of 'rock-marking' and comprise small, humanly-made semi-hemispherical hollows - like half a ping-pong ball - ground out of a rock surface. Cupules should not be confused with grinding or nut-breaking hollows for at least two reasons. First, at RSA TSH2 many of the cupules are on steeply sloping and even vertical surfaces - which would make it impossible to use as a grinding hollows. Secondly, many of the RSA TSH2 cupules are very close to the cave ceiling and in very uncomfortable locations, which would make grinding impractical. In any event, there are grinding hollows in nearby sites and these grinding hollows are larger, fewer and located on loose, practical boulders. The RSA TSH cupules have a diameter of between 11.5 mm to 51 mm and are between 2 mm - 17 mm deep.

3Rock-engravings: There is a single engraved groove 88.5 mm long, 19 mm deep and 4 mm deep. There is also and engraved antelope spoor (?Tsessebe) among the cupules. There is an odd wiggly line also engraved.