Rock Art and Early Cultural Dynamics in Eastern Mongolia

Abstract

Despite playing a key role in the history and prehistory of human societies in eastern Eurasia, the archaeological record of eastern Mongolia – particularly its rich tradition of rock art and petroglyphs – has been poorly integrated into western archaeological literature. We summarize a large body of recent scholarship from Mongolia’s three eastern provinces, Khentii, Sukhbaatar, and Dornod, to identify evidence of cultural activity in the region stretching from the Palaeolithic through the historic era. Rock art imagery from Eastern Mongolia reveals key insights into the region’s under-investigated archaeological record, including the co-occurrence of humans with megafauna such as the wooly rhinocerous and mammoth during the last Ice Age, occupation of the region by pre-pastoral cultures during the Holocene, and important pulses of activity associated with early pastoral cultures and empires during the Late Bronze and Iron Ages. Future analysis of these sites promises to help us understand the murkiest chapters in the region’s past.