Pásztor Emília (szerk.): Sámánizmus és természethit régen és ma - Bajai dolgozatok 23. (Baja, 2019)
Sergio Poggianella: A szakrális táj. A Dalmeri menedék sámánja
A Sacred Landscape. The Shaman of the Dalmeri Shelter more meaningful examples also exploit the various levels of the stone support, extending the painted figure to zones in relief or in the depressions of the stone, following the natural shape of the support and giving a three dimensional effect conferring depth on the flat colour of the contourless figures. Some stones have, on the reverse, a "marking", a small complex symbol, a point like sign in ochre, at the centre26; maybe a type of seal or signature. Striking however, is the fact that most of the stones, 86% are abstract designs or aniconic, while only 14% show animal or human figures. The frequency diagram for the various types of figure shows, for the 229 stones analysed: 166 stones or 72.5%, show traces of colour on one or more faces; 23 or 10% show animals; 19 or 8% show schematic designs or signs; only 7 stones, 3,1%, represent human figures; 2 show hands; in the remaining 12 stones, the colour is associated with traces of usage, with composite representations on two faces, colour associated with incisions and other colour residues. The more perplexing figures and signs, as to their meanings, are aniconic. In an article on the morphogenesis of aniconic signs, Gabriella Brusa-Zappellini shows 15 interesting phosphene models according to Max Koll and in a second figure, 20 geometrical decorations by Tucano indios, proposed by Reichel-Dolmatoff 1978 (Fig. 9-10)27. In the same article we read a reflection by J.D. Lewis Williams and T.A. Dowson published in "Current Anthropology", The Signs of All Times. Entoptic Phenomena in Upper Palaeolithic: in which the authors, based on neurological experiments on visual distortion, maintain that some aniconic signs in Palaeolithic art were a "graphic rendering" of phosphenes: "that is, luminous apparitions (zig-zag, points, nets etc) due to destabilisation of the optic system, arising during states of altered conscience linked, in archaic cultures, to shamanic ritual practice"28. We cannot here offer a detailed analysis of aniconic signs, on which there is ample literature but we can note - as also for the more figurative or realistic, of apparently easier understanding - their universal appearance in space and time, remembering that Upper Palaeolithic man had our same cognitive faculties, with full access to the symbolic function. Among the Dalmeri Shelter stones, we find striking for its beauty and symbolic pregnancy, the largest, representing a human figure, (Fig. 3). According to Giampaolo Dalmeri: The large anthropomorphic RD 211 - occupies an important position, certainly having a central ideological function. The corpus of archaeological data leads to a hypothesis that Epigravettian human groups conceived a sacred space, outlined by the deposition of painted stones having strong technical and stylistic unity"29. The fact that there are areas of concentration, with physical superposition of the stones and most upturned: "indicates repeated rituals and suggests that reversing, so hiding the image, was an integral part of the rite"30. The human figure painted on stone RD 211, could symbolise a mythical ancestor, 218 ///////////////////////^^^^^
