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

* 3.2.5 THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CUPULES *
One of the most controversial subjects of European cup-and-ring art,
is its dating and chronology. This is not only a problem of semantics
(the Scandinavian Neolithic for instance, starts at a later date than
the Neolithic of Britain: Fig. 92), but also of lack of evidence. In
Europe there has been no or insufficient scientific research into the
dating of different cup-andring
art sites. In my opinion
for example, the majority of
the carvings at Ballochmyle
(Fig. 129) are younger than
Ormaig (Fig. 190), but I have
no proof for this assumption.
It is only based on stylistic
comparison and geographical
arguments.
This lack of dating data
seriously inhibits further
investigation. Yet I venture
to suggest a basic chronology
for the cupules and cup-andrings
in Europe (Fig. 189).
Concerning the petroglyphs
of the European Neolithic, I
distinguish two distinct rock
art traditions: the cupule
tradition and cup-and-ring
art (a third concerns the
special range of abstract
motifs used in megalithic
art: indicated by a distinctly
FIG. 190: ORMAIG, SCOTLAND. red colour in Fig. 189 ).
In my opinion the cupule
tradition originated during an early movement (triggered in the SE of
Europe and perhaps Asia or Africa) to the north and west of Europe,
using the valleys and passes through the Alps and the waterways along
the Atlantic seaboard. In this respect, I would like to suggest here
that these Neolithic groups reached the European Atlantic seaboard
much earlier than generally accepted. A recently discovered megalithic
tomb on the west coast of Sligo, Ireland, seems to date from the
Mesolithic and may indeed confirm that the merging of the Neolithic
culture with the Mesolithic hunter-gatherer communities took place at
a much earlier date, notably during the sixth millennium BC (Fig.
189).
M. van HOEK: 235
GEOGRAPHY