🎨 Drakensberg Rock Art
South Africa
About This Sacred Site
The uKhahlamba-Drakensberg Park in South Africa contains one of the most outstanding and concentrated collections of rock paintings in the world. Created by the San (Bushmen) people over a period of at least 4,000 years, the paintings depict spiritual trances, ritual dances, rain-making ceremonies, and the relationship between the physical and spirit worlds. The UNESCO World Heritage Site preserves thousands of individual paintings in hundreds of rock shelters across the dramatic mountain landscape.
Key Facts
- •UNESCO World Heritage Site (mixed natural and cultural) since 2000
- •Contains over 35,000 individual rock paintings in some 600 shelters
- •The oldest paintings may date back over 3,000 years
- •Many paintings depict shamanic trance states and spiritual ceremonies
- •The San people believed the rock face was a veil between the human and spirit worlds
Location
Coordinates: -29.1000, 29.3000
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