Unusual Rock Carving Discovered in West Virginia
I found an interesting post today:
A few days ago, a gentleman was walking in the woods, in an undisclosed location in WV, when he happened upon a curiously carved rock. This particular gent has been all over this ground, for years, and had never noticed this rock carving before.
He came back and reported the find, and so far no one else has ever noticed it before either. Keep in mind these gents have been all over this territory hunting and such, and are keen observers due to that pursuit. No much gets by them, but no one has noticed this rock before.
I went out this morning in the company of one of them to see this rock for myself, as I was not a little dubious.
The rock itself is embedded in the bed of a small mountain stream, around 200 meters or so away from the nearest road, up a small hollow. The stream I think is mostly dry, but has had some water running in it lately due to heavy rains. The area it's in is little frequented, and mostly uninhabited.
The circle is 22 inches wide at the inside edge of the circle, and 21 1/2 inches tall at the inside edge of the circle. The depth that the circle is cut to is between 5/8 and 3/4 of an inch. The orientation of the stem of the central "tree" is east by north-east.
I did a cursory search of Google images (just the first 20 pages) and found similar, but not identical, figures. They were the Norse "World tree" (Yggdrasil), the Celtic "Tree of Life", and a Buddhist figure somewhat resembling the carving. None of these explains how THIS carving would be found in the middle of nowhere in West Virginia, with this obvious patina of age.
The "branches" of the central "tree" vaguely resemble the layout of the surrounding hollows. There has been some lively discussion today of whether or not this could be some sort of "map" of the surrounding one or two square miles. Some say it most likely IS, others are equally certain that it ISN'T. So far, no theory has been advanced as to why anyone would take the time to rock-cut a map of such a small area.
An idea has been advanced that it is some sort of Indian carving, but no purpose for it has been suggested.
Why the "tree"? Why the circle? Why in the middle of nowhere, off the beaten path, in an uninhabited area? Why in the middle of a stream bed? Who would take the time to carve it, and for what purpose?
Any ideas? Explanations? suggestions for further research? I have to admit my perplexity in the matter once again.
NOTE: The thread can be found at ATS. There were references about the patina of the carving not matching the surrounding rock surface, though on closer inspection it does seem that there is some overlap. Could it be a Knights of the Golden Circle map used to mark buried gold from Confederate sympathizers? Possible Native American? Take a look and judge for yourself (click the images for a larger version)...Lon
'Phantoms and Monsters'
Thanks!
posted by Lon at 12:48 PM
4 Comments:
My gut instinct right off the bat was runes--was thinking of the Kensington runestone in Minnesota, a way of marking land for ownership. Hmm... Someone should try and figure out when that was carved. Very cool!
The central "tree" part looks like the original Elder Sign as drawn by Lovecraft. Oh no! Cthulhu is in the hills!
But seriously, this is really neat. Gut reaction and the hidden skeptic in me says it could be natural, but it really doesn't look like it. If it was in a creek bed, could this be mapping out the creek and its tributaries?
It's interesting that it is raised off the rock, and not carved into it.
It's much more time consuming to carve a relief, after all.
Yggdrasil/Celtic "tree of life" doesn't seem to apply since it's meant to show as much above as below, indicating dualities. This "tree" seems to sprout from the base of circle, leaving the roots unseen. I like simple explanations, they tend to be true. That said, I would bank on the map theory or something similar. It could simply be an artistic statement since, as Ali pointed out, this bas relief would certainly take more effort than simply carving the image intaglio. We can only take the word of this individual that his "undisclosed" location is as remote as he claims. We don't know who has been there in the past or continues to pass through today. While living in Puerto Rico, I came across a relief of a face carved into stone using the style of the ancient Taino indians just randomly carved into a boulder on the side of a road no where near where anybody was living. It was too fresh to have been real, so I concluded that for whatever reason, some artist felt the need to add his own touch to that ancient tradition of Taino petroglyphs.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home