Images of Mystery. Rock Art of the Drakensberg by Lewis-Williams, David

(Cape Town: Double Storey, 2003) 191993006X. 305 x 265 mm; laminated pictorial wrappers; pp. 127; maps; full-colour and monochrome illustrations. Near-fine condition. "The southern African mountains known as the Drakensberg are the storehouse of a remarkable art - the now-mute paintings made on the walls of remote rock shelters by the San, or Bushmen. For a combination of exquisite detail, animation and sheer variety, the art is unrivalled by any other rock art in the world. Prominent in many of the shelters are paintings of animals that can still be seen in the vicinity. But there are also enigmatic images that, for well over a hundred years, have baffled those who have been fortunate enough to see them: people with antelope heads and hoofs, dancers performing rituals, strange creatures of no known species. Whatever they may have meant to those who made them, these images take us into another world of thought and symbol. It is with these mysteries that this book is concerned. As we contemplate the art anew, we discover we can reach out and touch another world, one that enriches our appreciation of the human condition." .