Maarten van Hoek The Geography of Cup-and-Ring ... - StoneWatch

FIGURE 87: SPRONS 2.
The lack of rock art in the Dolomites has already been noted when
discussing the ceremonial centre at Elvas. It is evident that the
towering Dolomite peaks have not been the object of any kind of rock
art related worship. The people who carved cupules avoided that area
for some unknown reason, as cupuled rocks are only found along its
western and northern fringes in valleys leading north and west, clearly
ignoring the Dolomite area to the east. East leading valleys only
occasionally have cupuled rocks at their entrances. It is moreover
striking that in general simple cupmarked rocks are often found at the
entrances of the side-valleys or at a major turning point and that the
Dolomite peaks are out of view from these sites.
In comparison with the distribution patterns in Scotland (where the
direction of the routes through the interior were focussed on northern
and eastern areas) one could say that in the Alpine area the flow of
migrating people initially was directed to the north and west, not to
the east. These migration flows from the British Isles and the Alpine
areas ultimately reached Scandinavia, although it is certain that it
never was the objective of those peoples to reach Scandinavia. Possibly
they once were forced out of their original homelands and just
coincidentally travelled as far north as possible. This seems to be
confirmed by the distribution patterns of cup-and-rings in Scandinavia,
which will be discussed in Chapter 1.5.
M. van HOEK: 110
GEOGRAPHY