DATING PRE-HISTORIC PAINTED FIGURES FROM THE SERRA DA CAPIVARA NATIONAL PARK, PIAUÍ, BRAZIL

Pierluigi Rosina; Sara Garcês; Hugo Gomes; George H. Nash; Niède Guidon; Thalison dos Santos; Cristiane Buco; Qingfeng Shao; Carmela Vaccaro

Rock Art Research

Vol. 39 No. 1 (2022)
Published : May 13, 2022

DATING PRE-HISTORIC PAINTED FIGURES FROM THE SERRA DA CAPIVARA NATIONAL PARK, PIAUÍ, BRAZIL

Pierluigi Rosina ⁽¹⁾, Sara Garcês ⁽²⁾, Hugo Gomes ⁽³⁾, George H. Nash ⁽⁴⁾, Niède Guidon ⁽⁵⁾, Thalison dos Santos ⁽⁶⁾, Cristiane Buco ⁽⁷⁾, Qingfeng Shao ⁽⁸⁾, Carmela Vaccaro ⁽⁹⁾

(1) Polytechnic Institute of Tomar, Portugal

(2) Polytechnic Institute of Tomar, Portugal

(3) Geosciences Centre, University of Coimbra

(4) Polytechnic Institute of Tomar, Portugal

(5) Museum of the American Man Foundation – FUMDHAM

(6) National Museum, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro – UFRJ

(7) Institute of National Historical and Artistic Heritage – IPHAN

(8) College of Geography Science, Nanjing Normal University, China

(9) University of Ferrara. Department of Physics and Earth Science, Italy

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Abstract

Painted rock art figures from the Boqueirão da Pedra Furada and Toca do Paraguaio shelters (Serra da Capivara, Piauí, Brazil) have been recently analysed using various recognised scientific techniques. After the geochemical results, the samples that revealed carbonate were used for the dating process. Uranium-series disequilibrium dating (U/Th) methods were applied to two of those samples: sample 4 from Toca do Paraguaio (TP04) (a dark red geometric figure), and sample 2 from Toca do Boqueirão da Pedra Furada (BPF2) (a white circular figure). The dates obtained from the U/Th dating provided maximum ages of the paintings. These dates also allowed indirect association of the painting events with the data retrieved from the archaeological excavation. In this paper, we consider, albeit briefly, the archaeological history of the sites and their context into a broader landscape and suggest that geometric figures belong to the early Holocene.