Weapons and Tools in Rock Art

About the Author: Ana M. S. Bettencourt is Assistant Professor of Archaeology (with Habilitation) at Departamento de Histria, Instituto de Cincias Socias da Universidade do Minho, Braga, Portugal, where she teaches the Archaeology degree and masters. She has also given several lectures in other Portuguese and Spanish universities and has been advisor of several Ph.D. and master's theses and dissertations of Portuguese and foreign students. Her main research interests are: burial contexts and practices; rock art; metallurgy and mining of the Iberian Peninsula Prehistory, under which she has published numerous books, book chapters and articles in international journals and developed, as responsible researcher, several projects with international funding. Currently she is Head of the History Department and Director of the Master in Archaeology.
About the Author: Manuel-Santos-Estévez obtained his PhD in History in 2004 at the University of Santiago de Compostela, Galicia. His main research is oriented to rock art, sculpture, and landscape archaeology. From 1995 he was a post-doctoral researcher in the Landscape Archaeology Laboratory (USC) and of Institute of Galician Studies Padre Sarmiento (CSIC) and, since 2009, hired researcher at Institute of History (CCHS-CSIC). Since 2014 he is a post-doctoral researcher of Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, at Universidade do Minho, Braga, Portugal. He directed 50 archaeological projects, including at Campo Lameiro Archaeological Park, in Galicia, Spain. He also participates in several projects related to rock art. He published a number of papers in international reviews as Trabajos de Prehistoria, World Archaeology, Journal of Indo-European Studies or Journal of Archaeological Science.
About the Author: Hugo Aluai Sampaio has a Ph.D. in Settlement and Landscape Archaeology at Universidade do Minho, Braga, Portugal. Its research is dedicated to the Northwestern Bronze Age, focusing on issues related to metallurgy and deposition of metallic objects, funerary practices and contexts, settlement and rock art. He also developed projects in the area of Archaeology and Tourism. He has published in books, book chapters, as well as in several international journals. He is an invited Assistant at Universidade do Minho, Braga, and Instituto Polictécnico do Cávado e do Ave, Portugal, when he teaches curricular units about Archaeological Heritage and Prehistory.
Weapons and tools are frequently found depicted in rock art in many parts of the globe and different periods and in varying social contexts. This collection of papers by leading rock art specialists examines the subjective and metaphorical value of weapons and tools in art, the actions that created them, and their contexts. It also takes into account that such representations incorporate and transmit some kind of understanding about the world and the relationship between objects and humans. Contributors analyse objects and weapons as status symbols, as evidences of cultural contacts, as ideological devices, etc. Divided into regional sections which, for once, do not focus on Scandinavia, chapters deal with the representations of weapons and certain kinds of tools (such as axes and sickles) in different prehistoric, protohistoric and traditional community contexts all over the world. Attention focuses on rock art, but also looks at stelae and statue-menhirs, as well as other kinds of ‘container’ or vehicle for this kind of depiction.
The major concern is to discuss the possible meanings of these embodied signs in different areas and periods, since meanings are permeable both to time and space. Papers either centre their attention in broader approaches based on a specific area, region or people, or focus on particular case studies.