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Rock Drawings in Valcamonica

Italy
Date of Inscription: 1979
Criteria: (iii)(vi)
Province of Brescia, Lombardy
N45 57 25.4 E10 17 50.4
Ref: 94

Brief Description

Valcamonica, situated in the Lombardy plain, has one of the world's greatest collections of prehistoric petroglyphs – more than 140,000 symbols and figures carved in the rock over a period of 8,000 years and depicting themes connected with agriculture, navigation, war and magic.

Statement of Significance

Valcamonica's rock art, which consists of over 140,000 engravings on about 2,400 rocks distributed on both sides of an entire valley, constitutes an exceptional example of this kind of manifestation of human thought.

The number, duration and variety of the engravings, representing for example navigation, dance, war and ploughing and their relationship with contemporary archaeological sites, contribute to the exceptional value of this assemblage. Furthermore, the apparent continuation of the practice of engraving for a period of more than 8,000 years, from the Epipaleolithic until the Roman and Mediaeval periods, and in some cases until modern times, links this extraordinary expression of human creativity to present day communities.

Criterion (iii): The rock drawings of Valcamonica stretch back over the 8 thousand years which precede our present era. It is unnecessary to accent the conspicuously invaluable nature of human renderings which are of so great an antiquity.

Criterion (vi): The rock drawings of Valcamonica constitute an extraordinary figurative documentation of prehistoric customs and mentality. The systematic interpretation, typological classification, and the chronological study of these configurations in stone have brought about a considerable contribution to the fields of prehistory, sociology and ethnology.

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