Archaeologists identified 16 sites with representations of human footprints, animals and celestial bodies.
The archaeological sites are located on rocky cliffs close to each other in Brazil’s Jalapão State Park. (Image credit: Rômulo Macêdo
Archaeologists in Brazil found a bunch of really old rock carvings that are about 2,000 years old. These carvings show things like human footprints, shapes that look like stars and planets, and pictures of animals like deer and wild pigs. They found all these carvings during three trips they took between 2022 and 2023 in Jalapão State Park, which is in Tocantins state. The researchers from Brazil’s National Institute of Historic and Artistic Heritage (IPHAN) found 16 places where people lived a long time ago, all near each other on rocky cliffs.
Rômulo Macêdo, the archaeologist in charge, said, “Since these sites are close to each other, it seems like they might all be connected somehow. This helps us understand how the ancient communities in this area lived.”
Similar rock art findings at different sites in Jalapão suggest they are linked. (Image credit: Rômulo Macêdo)
The archaeologists found lots of carvings made by scratching the rocks, like symbols and shapes. They also found a few red paintings in some places. Macêdo said, “It seems the paintings are older than the carvings, and they might have been made by a different group of people.”
The discovery of rock art is “rare and important” because before this, archaeologists had only found stone tools from the Indigenous people who lived in Jalapão before the Europeans came, according to Marcos Zimmermann, a professor of archaeology at the Federal University of Tocantins in Brazil, who was not part of this recent discovery.
The pottery and tools that were found before might have been used to make the art. “The carvings were likely made using sharp rocks or pieces of wood, and the paint was probably made from crushed iron minerals found a lot in the area. People might have mixed the powder with animal or plant fat and put it on the rocks using their fingers or sticks,” Macêdo explained.
Scientists estimate that the rock carvings are about 2,000 years old. (Image credit: Rômulo Macêdo)
The discoveries in Jalapão haven’t been fully studied yet. But they seem to have some things in common with other archaeological sites in different parts of Brazil. This makes experts like Macêdo think that the rock art is about 2,000 years old.
“By studying the rock art more and digging up more stuff from these sites, we can learn more about how these Indigenous groups lived and what they believed in,” he said. The discoveries might also help us understand the symbols and meanings that were important to the people who lived here before Europeans came, Macêdo added.
Jalapão State Park is a big area of about 13,000 square miles. It’s a dry place with sand dunes, rivers, and huge rocks, which makes it different from the rest of the Cerrado biome, a special kind of tropical grassland known for having lots of different plants and animals. It’s located around 430 to 500 miles south of the Amazon rainforest.
But there hasn’t been much archaeological work done in Jalapão. Most of the studies have been done when construction or farming projects need to be done. Some parts of the state have given us artifacts that are between 425 and 12,000 years old, including pottery and arrowheads. Zimmermann, who worked at the Tocantins Archaeology Center, shared this information.
