On a scattering
of remote islands called the Dampier Archipelago, located off the northwest
coast of Australia, people have been carving stories on rocks for thousands
of years. In some places, the rock carvings are so dense that they cover every
available surface of the deep red weathered rocks. Over the past 30 years, this
remote region, once home only to Aboriginal tribes and wallabies, has become
increasingly industrialized leading to worries about possible acceleration
of weathering and deterioration of the rock art. With further development planned,
the government of Western Australia has commissioned a study of these relics
to determine what role industry might be playing in their deterioration.
In northwestern Australia, more than one million Aboriginal engravings pepper
the landscape. Since the 1960s, development has been encroaching on the area,
leading to worries about how emissions might be affecting weathering and deterioration
rates of the rock art. Photos by Bill Carr.
This is the largest petroglyph series in the world and a very important
area, says Robert Bednarik, an archaeologist who is president of the International
Federation of Rock Art Organizations (IFRAO) and leader of a conservation movement
to monitor and save the petroglyphs. No one knows exactly how many individual
petroglyphs litter the surfaces of the 2.7-billion-year-old plutonic stones
in Dampier, but estimates suggest more than one million. Bednarik has been working
to preserve the site since 1969 when industry first moved in, he says.
Currently, the 22-kilometer-long Burrup Peninsula, which is located in the middle
of the Dampier region, and is one of Australias busiest ports and hosts
three large industrial facilities a salt-processing plant, a liquid natural
gas processing plant and an iron processing plant. The government of Western
Australia has proposed adding six new industries to Burrup, thus bringing the
debate over development versus cultural heritage preservation to a head. Bednarik
and others urge that the industries instead move into a large alternative site
nearby where there is little threat of endangering the petroglyphs.
The government appreciates the cultural and heritage value of the rock
art, while also recognizing [that] the Burrup industrial precinct is of vital
economic importance to the local, state and national economies, says Frank
Murray, an environmental scientist at Murdoch University in Perth. So before
deciding on a location, the government commissioned researchers from CSIRO (Australias
national scientific research organization) and Murdoch University to monitor
sites both near the industrial buildings and far across the Burrup Peninsula.
Work began this summer, and for the next four years, scientists will monitor
atmospheric emissions and their effects on the rocks. At the end of the study
period, they will report their findings to the government and recommend any
future actions, says Murray, who is chair of the Burrup Rock Art Monitoring
Management Committee, which oversees the studies. These studies are to
be the most thorough scientific research of impacts on rock art ever undertaken
in Australia, Murray says.
The CSIRO project is interdisciplinary and large in scope. Atmospheric scientists
will measure ambient concentrations and deposition of pollutants from seven
different sites. Microbiologists will examine the role of microbes in deteriorating
the rock, and test whether increased levels of nitrogen or sulfur from emissions
promote further microbial activity. And geochemists and archaeologists will
assess the amount of weathering on the rocks by analyzing physical, mineralogical
and chemical changes of the rocks, using optical and scanning electron microscopes.
They will also use a mineral mapping tool to record subtle color and mineral
spectral changes in the surface minerals over time between the engravings and
the adjacent undisturbed rock surfaces.
Such techniques have in part been used worldwide, including in the American
Southwest, to monitor changes to rock art, but this is new for Australia, Bednarik
says. The CSIRO project is a step in the right direction in the sense
that it will provide good quantitative data on real pollution and pollutant
precipitation, Bednarik says. But, he says, the study lacks depth in researching
the geochemistry of the rocks and the deterioration processes.
Still, as acid rain and emissions threaten sites worldwide, the effect of modern
society on rock art is an important topic to study and is definitely under-researched,
says Ben Swartz, an archaeologist at Ball State University in Indiana who is
active in IFRAO. But even more than conservation, he says, the most important
thing is to record whats there, before its gone.
Megan Sever
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