Pre-Colombian Jamaica: Caribbean Archeology and Ethnohistory

Aboriginal Indian Remains in Jamaica by J. E. Duerden / 283
a charcoal pencil, otherwise
one could not obtain a
good negative. No remains
of pottery were to be seen,
but apparently a cavity occurs
below and has become
filled up by fallen stone.
Fig. XVIII. Three of the rock- carvings at Kempshot,
St. James.
Rock- Pictures
A series of rock- pictures has
lately been discovered in
the island, associated with
the petroglyphs at Mountain
River, and occurring
on the inner surface of the
block of stone [51] constituting
the recess. They are
rough representations of
various forms of animals,
such as lizards, birds, and turtles, between one and two hundred figures being
depicted. The pigment employed is black, and can not be readily abraded. Further
examination is necessary before a more detailed description can be given.
Petroglyphs in Other West Indian Islands
An important and valuable paper upon the petroglyphs of the Greater and
Lesser Antilles has recently been published by M. Pinart (Note sur les Pétroglyphes
et Antiquités des Grandes et Petites Antilles, Par A. L. Pinart, Paris,
1890. Folio Facsimile of ms.) Unfortunately we have not been able to obtain
a copy of this, and for what follows are indebted to the extracts given in the
very elaborate work by Colonel Garrick Mallery on “ Picture- writing of the
American Indians” (Tenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology, 1888–
89). Pinart explored a number of the islands of the West Indies but found that
the neighbouring one of Porto Rico furnishes the greatest amount of evidence
of development in the pictographic art. At la Cueva del Islote, on the north
side of the island, are to be seen inscriptions all around. “The incisions are very
deep, and the edges are generally dulled by the blows of the hammer; in certain
spots, toward the lower part of the grotto, several inscriptions are partially effaced
by the action of the sea, but those of the upper part are in a remarkable
state of preservation. Beneath certain principal figures of the groups are little