The Blood of the Ancestors Grotto:
Ritual Behavior



Lenville J. Stelle
Parkland College
Champaign, Illinois







A paper presented at the
73nd Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology
Vancourver, British Columbia
Canada
April 2008






Abstract:

The Blood of the Ancestors Grotto (11SA557) has proven to be a rock art site likely associated with female spirituality and healing. One yet unexplored avenue to a fuller understanding of the art centers on the evidence for repeated social behaviors identifying boundaries between the sacred and the profane and behavioral pathways for correct interaction/contact between the two. Some of these behaviors seem connected to natural rhythms and periodicities. Descriptions of these rituals and their possible ethnographically documented analogues in early historic populations are offered.