Virginia Solstice Observatories, Portable Art, and Rockart Sites

About the Book

This publication presents Virginia’s art forms from rockart sites to portable specimens. They are defined and illustrated with the scope of the study as prehistoric communications (or ancient writings) from a world of long ago. Art is the physical output from someone’s cognitive processes that attempts to convey a message about the world as the artist sees it (Hranicky, 1985). The art forms imply ceremonies and/or special attention to environmental events and physical objects.

About the Author

Jack Hranicky is a retired US government contractor, but he has been involved with archaeology as a full-time passion for over forty years. His main interest is the Paleo-Indian period; however, he has worked in all facets of American archaeology. He has published over two hundred fifty papers and over forty books on archaeology, with his most recent being a two-volume, eight-hundred-page, ten-thousand-artifact book on the material culture of Virginia. In Virginia, he is considered an expert on prehistoric stone tools and rockart. The prehistoric Spout Run Observatory site was investigated by him, which dates to 10,470 YBP. He has served as president of the Archeological Society of Virginia (ASV) and Eastern States Archeological Federation (ESAF) and has been past chairman of the Alexandria Archaeology Commission in Virginia. He is a charter member of the Registry of Professional Archaeologists (RPA). And since he joined the ASV in 1966, he is its senior member. And finally, his major publications are Bipoints Before Clovis and North American Projectile Points.