The Courthouse Wash Pictographs are a series of large

pictograph A pictogram (also pictogramme, pictograph, or simply picto) is a graphical symbol that conveys meaning through its visual resemblance to a physical object. Pictograms are used in systems of writing and visual communication. A pictography is a wri ...

s created over a long period of time, located on a sheltered

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

wall at the mouth of Courthouse Wash,

Arches National Park Arches National Park is a List of national parks of the United States, national park of the United States in eastern Utah. The park is adjacent to the Colorado River, north of Moab, Utah. The park contains more than 2,000 natural arch, natural ...

in Grand County,

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

, United States, just north of

Moab Moab () was an ancient Levant, Levantine kingdom whose territory is today located in southern Jordan. The land is mountainous and lies alongside much of the eastern shore of the Dead Sea. The existence of the Kingdom of Moab is attested to by ...

, that is listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

(NRHP).

Description

The series of images depict a variety of figures, many of them anthropomorphic and measuring up to in height. The Courthouse wash site is located near the junction of Courthouse Wash with the

Colorado River The Colorado River () is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The river, the List of longest rivers of the United States (by main stem), 5th longest in the United St ...

, extending over a 100-meter section of cliff base. The pictographs include painted figures resembling those found in Horseshoe Canyon in

Canyonlands National Park Canyonlands National Park is a national park of the United States located in southeastern Utah near the town of Moab. The park preserves a colorful landscape eroded into numerous canyons, mesas, and buttes by the Colorado River, the Green Rive ...

, to the west. Other figures, including those of animals, have been incised by removal of the rock's covering of

desert varnish Desert varnish or rock varnish is an orange-yellow to black coating found on exposed rock surfaces in arid environments. Desert varnish is approximately one micrometer thick and exhibits nanometer-scale layering. Rock rust and desert patina ar ...

. The painted figures follow the Barrier Canyon Style and are believed to be between 1500 and 4000 years old. The incised figures are attributed to the

Fremont culture The Fremont culture or Fremont people is a pre-Columbian archaeological culture which received its name from the Fremont River in the U.S. state of Utah, where the culture's sites were discovered by local indigenous peoples like the Navajo and Ut ...

and are dated to about 1000-1200 AD. Figures mounted on horseback were created in historical times since the 16th century introduction of horses and are attributed to

Navajo The Navajo or Diné are an Indigenous people of the Southwestern United States. Their traditional language is Diné bizaad, a Southern Athabascan language. The states with the largest Diné populations are Arizona (140,263) and New Mexico (1 ...

Ute Ute or UTE may refer to: * Ute people, a Native American people of the Great Basin * Ute Indian Tribe of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation, Utah * Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah * Southern Ute Indian Tribe of the Southern ...

artists. The site is accessible from a footpath, from

U.S. Route 191 U.S. Route 191 (US 191) is a north–south highway in the Western United States and a spur of parent route U.S. Route 91 that has two segments. The southern segment runs for from Douglas, Arizona on the Mexican border to the southern part o ...

northeast of Moab. The site was extensively vandalized in 1980, but has been conserved. The Courthouse Wash site was placed on the NRHP on April 1, 1976.

References

External links

Courthouse Wash Panel at nps.gov
{{National Register of Historic Places Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in Utah National Register of Historic Places in Arches National Park National Register of Historic Places in Grand County, Utah Fremont culture Petroglyphs in Utah Vandalized works of art in Utah

Description

See also

References

External links