Imagine wandering through one of Earth’s toughest deserts and stumbling upon a gigantic, ancient art gallery carved into stone! 🏜️ About 12,000 years ago, hunter-gatherers in the Arabian desert etched life-sized camels and other animals on sandstone cliffs and boulders. These monumental carvings weren’t just for decoration—they were survival guides pointing to vital water sources. 💧
Researchers recently uncovered this rock art south of the Nefud desert in northern Saudi Arabia, spanning roughly 30 km of rugged, mountainous terrain. In total, over 60 rock panels showcase more than 130 animal figures—mostly camels, but also ibex, gazelles, wild donkeys and even an aurochs, the wild ancestor of modern cattle. Some camel engravings tower over 2 meters tall and stretch 2.6 meters long!
But the real cliffhanger? One masterpiece sits a heart-stopping 39 meters above the ground, featuring 19 camels and three donkeys. To create it, ancient artists had to balance on a narrow, sloping ledge with no safety gear—definitely not your average rock-climbing workout! 🧗♂️
“It would have been extremely dangerous… but they had the skill to still produce a naturalistic representation,” says archaeologist Maria Guagnin of the University of Sydney and the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, lead author of the study in Nature Communications. Their work shows how prehistoric people used art as a map to survive scorching, waterless landscapes.
These ancient camel carvings are more than stunning artwork—they’re a testament to human creativity and resilience. Who knew that a rock engraving could be the ultimate life hack 12 millennia ago? 🤯
Reference(s):
Camels carved in ancient Arabian rock art indicate vital water sources
cgtn.com
