ARCTIC ANTHROPOLOGY, Vol. 48, No. 2, pp. 17–24, 2011 ISSN 0066-6939© 2011 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System

Petroglyphs from Gillon Point, Agattu Island, Aleutian Islands, Alaska

Dixie West, Debra G. Corbett, Christine Lefèvre

Abstract. In 2002, biologists with the National Marine Fisheries Service recorded petroglyphs while counting sea lions at the rookery near Gillon Point on Agattu Island, Aleutian Islands. This is the fi rst well-documented rock art in the Aleutian archipelago. The images, individu-ally and in groups, appear to represent female genitalia, rectangles and straight lines, and an anthropomorphic fi gure. The Agattu petroglyphs either represent art that arose in situ or motifs imported from elsewhere. The engravings do not reveal evidence of contact with human groups living to the west or south.

IntroductionIn 1999, National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) biologists discovered rock art at Gillon Point on Agattu Island, Aleutian Islands, Alaska while counting Steller sea lions (Eumetopias jubatus) in the area. Engraved in basalt slabs along the shore, the images resemble rectangles, ovals, arcs, female genitalia, and an anthropomorphic fi gure. Tom Loughlin of NMFS reported the discovery to the Western Aleutians Archaeological and Paleobio-logical Project co-directors Debra Corbett, Christine Lefèvre, and Dixie West. On hearing of this discov-ery, the archaeologists requested that Loughlin’s re-search team record the images when biologists next counted sea lions at the rookery. Biologists photo-graphed the engravings at Gillon Point during July 2002. This discovery represents the fi rst recorded in situ rock art in the Alaskan Aleutian Islands.

Setting: Gillon Point, Agattu IslandAgattu Island is an island 37 km southwest of Shemya (Fig.1). Thirty-two km long and 18 km wide, it is the southernmost island in the Near Is-land group of the Aleutian archipelago. Agattu is 61 m above sea level on the south side and rises to 180 m above sea level on the north. The north-east section of the island reaches 580 m above sea level. Reefs surround the island, and the shoreline is rocky and steep (Corbett 1991; Sekora 1973).

USBIA ANCSA (1990) reported a village site designated ATU-032, at Gillon Point, at the extreme western end of Agattu. The site is on a pointed bluff overlooking a boulder beach surrounded on three sides by rough waters where the Bering Sea and the Pacifi c Ocean meet (Fig. 2). The archaeo-logical site is small, consisting of 30 tightly clus-tered pits at the bluff point (USBIA ANCSA1990:

Dixie West, Natural History Museum and Biodiversity Research CenterDyche Hall, 1345 Jayhawk Boulevard, University of Kansas, Lawrence Kansas 66045

Debra G. Corbett, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 1011 E.Tudor Road, Anchorage Alaska 99503

Christine Lefèvre, Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle and CNRS, UMR 7209,55 rue Buffon, CP 55, 75005 Paris, France

18 Arctic Anthropology 48:2

63). Several of the pits appear rectangular, but most are oval. USBIA ANCSA archaeologists reported seeing an unfi nished biface, a fl ake, whale bones, fi re-cracked rock, fi sh bones, and pinniped bones at the site, but do not appear to have collected any of these materials. The archaeologists did not collect samples for radiocarbon dating, nor did they inves-tigate the bluff edge because the Gillon Point beach is a protected rookery for the endangered Steller sea lion; thus, the rock art was not discovered until the 1999 sea lion count.

Rumors of Aleutian PetroglyphsThe possibility of petroglyphs in the Western Aleutians was recognized nearly a century be-fore their discovery. Between 1909 and 1910 Wal-demar Jochelson led the Ethnological Division of the Kamchatka-Aleutian Expedition sponsored by the Imperial Russian Geographical Society of

Petrograd. He published three volumes (1925, 1928, 1933) in English on the archaeology, ethnol-ogy, and anthropology of the Aleutian Islands and Kamchatka Peninsula. In a brief note, Jochelson (1925:122) proposed topics for future Aleutian ex-ploration including the following: “On Agatu [sic] Island is a grotto-like cave on the walls of which are many fi gures representing woman’s [sic] sex-ual part [sic]. They were made by a shaman named Hani’kax, which means ‘The one who is stand-ing on the water’s surface.’ Told by the Attu Aleut Philaret Prokopyeff and Michael Prosoff.”

An unpublished fi eld map by Theodore Bank (n.d.) shows the proposed location of a “cave con-taining petroglyphs (reported by an Aleut)” as sit-uated at the southeast point of Agattu Island. Pos-sibly a cave containing more petroglyphs exists on the southeast coast of Agattu. Future archaeolog-ical survey on the southeast side of Agattu might determine whether such a cave exists.

In her book, Aleut Art, Lydia Black (2003:118–119) stated, “We know next to nothing about Aleut prehistoric pictorial art, in spite of Jochel-son’s report (on the basis of information obtained from local informants) that on Agattu there were caves with petroglyphs, no such caves have been located . . . . The evidence of artifacts, collected in historic times, and observers’ statements, however, demonstrate that in pre-contact and early contact times the Aleuts had a fl ourishing fl at art in which complex geometric designs, including curvilinear motifs, and spirals as well as complex rosettes, were executed in polychrome.” The discovery of the Gil-lon Point petroglyphs confi rms Jochelson’s report.

Image Descriptions and Measurements

The images at Gillon Point are engraved on tilted slabs of a mafi c intermediate lava fl ow (Kirsten Ni-colaysen, Whitman College, Washington, personal communication 2006) 10.06 m above sea level. The lava blocks bearing the images are located away from the sea and shoulder the bluff where Elymus grass tussocks grow (Figs. 2 and 3). Biolo-gist Tom Loughlin (personal communication 2000) reported that sea lions were literally lying on some of the images, and some engravings are highly pol-ished and eroded because of exposure to the ele-ments and sea lion action. Perhaps more engrav-ings occurred on lava slabs near the water. If they did exist, the images have disappeared due to the erosion caused by ocean waves and sea lion activ-ities. It is also impossible to tell if the remaining images once were colored.

Biologists digitally photographed images found on 19 separate lava slabs. Images range from 7.4 to 33.5 cm wide and from 9.5 to 52 cm high.

Figure 1. The Aleutian Islands, Alaska, with Agattu Island located near the western terminus of the archipelago.

Figure 2. Aerial photograph of Gillon Point, on the west side of Agattu Island showing fl at, volcanic slabs (R) on which art images are located. House pits of the prehistoric village site AG-4 are visible in the upper center of the photo. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

West et al. : Petroglyphs from the Aleutian Islands 19

The images were probably executed by pecking at the lava slabs, perhaps using locally available, hand sized chunks of basalt from the nearby beach or bluff. No implements, however, were recog-nized so we do not know the characteristics of the tools used to create them.

Artists took advantage of the relatively fl at surfaces of the lava fl ow. During Ales Hrdlic ka’s prodigious collecting expeditions for the Smithso-nian Institution in the 1930s, he searched for, but failed to fi nd, parietal art in the Aleutians. Hrdlic ka (1945:141) noted, “No true petroglyphs have been reported from the islands, or seen or heard of by us on our expeditions. The chief reason for this was the absence of suitable rock walls.” The basalt slabs at Gillon Point presented the parietal artist/s with a rare, but suitable, canvas for engraving.

The Agattu rock art represents ovals, semi-circles, rectangles, and lines (Figs. 4–11). The rock surfaces show no preparation, and the en-gravings are not superimposed on one another. Oval images appear associated with one another,

Figure 3. National Marine Fisheries Service biologists recording the rock art at Gillon Point. The art is located on tilted volcanic slabs on the beach. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

Figure 4. Gillon Point images shaped like female geni-talia. The scale used in the photo is 6 inches (15.24 cm) long. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

Figure 5. Gillon Point images. Several of the “genita-lia” appear to have sweeping lines or “trails” attached. The scale used in the photo is 6 inches (15.24 cm) long. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

but rectangles appear isolated. Many of the Gil-lon Point images represent ovals with bisecting lines that resemble female genitalia (Figs. 4–6). In one example (Fig. 5), the vulvae have associated curved lines leading away from them that resem-ble contrails. The genitalia are oriented in differ-ent directions perhaps indicating that the artist/s shifted positions while pecking the fi gures. Ovals adjacent to each show different levels of weather-ing, suggesting that the fi gures were drawn at dif-ferent times (Figs. 4–5). Another image (Fig. 7) as-sumes the shape of the classic female “V” of the lower abdomen. When compared with other oval

20 Arctic Anthropology 48:2

Figure 7. Oval image with lines at Gillon Point. The image is 13.5 cm high and 17 cm wide. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

Figure 8. Arc-shaped image at Gillon Point. This may represent an image that is only partially completed. The image is 23 cm high and 16.5 cm wide. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

Figure 9. Large, rectangular-shaped image at Gillon Point. The scale used in the photo is 6 inches (15.24 cm) long. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

rectangle in Figure 9 appears very weathered; the edges of the Figure 10 rectangle appear more crisp than those in Figure 9. The NMFS biolo-gists did not map the relationship of different rock art slabs to each other or their proximity to the sea. It is impossible to tell from the photo-graphs if highly weathered fi gures eroded because of tide action or because they are older than other images.

Figure 6. Ovals with lines at Gillon Point. The scale used in the photo is 6 inches (15.24 cm) long. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

fi gures, some images (Fig. 8) appear to be unfi n-ished. If that is the case, it suggests that engraving was an ongoing process. Some Gillon Point im-ages are rectangles with bisecting lines that run parallel or perpendicular to the long axis of the image (Figs. 9 and 10). Like the oval fi gures, the rectangles exhibit differential weathering. The

West et al. : Petroglyphs from the Aleutian Islands 21

form of the genitalia images. This fi gure lacks the fi ne detail found in three-dimensional bone and ivory carvings found in the eastern and central Aleutians (Black 2003).

Black (2003:53–54) noted that art objects from the Rat Islands and the far Western Aleutians are very distinct where “anthropomorphic carv-ings predominate in the Rat Islands, as in the case in the Eastern Aleutians, while in the Near Islands zoomorphic carvings dominate the inventory.” The anthropomorphic fi gure at Gillon Point dem-onstrates that this image style also existed in the Near Islands.

DiscussionThe discovery of sexual motifs in Agattu imagery is not surprising. In 1996, Stephen Loring of the Smithsonian Institution investigated a small vil-lage site designated ATU-057, at Karab Cove on the south side of Agattu. Archaeologists excavated three components including a Russian-Aleut hunt-ing camp dating 1765–1785. Artifacts included trade goods, sea-otter hunting equipment, and a stone carving of a human penis (Black 2003: 63, Fig. 66; Loring, personal comment 1998). The dis-covery of the stone penis and vulvae engravings on Agattu indicates that both male and female mo-tifs were executed in the Near Islands.

When discussing this Aleutian imagery, three key questions arise. Did the inspiration for the Gil-lon Point petroglyphs originate in the Aleutians or was this artistic style imported from elsewhere? Is there a particular reason the petroglyphs are at Gillon Point; is there signifi cance to the location? What do the images, individually or collectively, mean or how were they intended to function?

Origins of the Agattu PetroglyphsDo the Agattu petroglyphs represent: 1) art that arose in situ, 2) imagery imported from the east, or 3) communication with human groups living to the west or south? Information gleaned from the ethnographic, historical, and archaeological rec-ords is useful in answering this question. Venia-minov (1984:219) stated, “As for their knowledge of the future, old Aleuts assert that some of their famous shamans had predicted, long before the coming of the Russians, that white men with dif-ferent customs would come to them from beyond the sea and that subsequently all Aleuts would be-come just like the newcomers and live according to their manner.” Jochelson (1933:23) stated that, “An aleut [sic] boy, who was taken in 1747 by Rus-sian hunter from Attu to Kamchatka, reported that, as he remembered, men dressed in long many- colored silk and cotton clothing came to the island Attu in small ships with one sail: their heads were shaved to the crown and the hair on the back was

Figure 10. Rectangle with bisecting line at Gillon Point. A single pecked line is shown at the right of the photograph. The image is 19.5 cm high and 13 cm wide. (Photo cour-tesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

Figure 11. Human fi gure engraved in rock at Gillon Point. Note that the lines representing the legs possess a curve similar to the genitalia images. The image is 52 cm high and 33 cm wide. (Photo courtesy of Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisheries Service.)

Perhaps the most interesting image is a large anthropomorphic fi gure (Fig. 11) measuring 52 cm high and 33 cm wide. The very faint image is the outline of a faceless human with outstretched arms and bowed legs that repeat the curvilinear

22 Arctic Anthropology 48:2

plaited into tresses. Evidently these were China-men (if the report is correct).”

During the eighteenth century Asian explor-ers and hunters sailed in Bering Sea and North Pa-cifi c waters (Fisher 1977; Smith and Barnett 1990). C. W. Brooks (1878 cited in Nelson 2007) de-scribed Japanese and Russian shipwrecks on Aleu-tian shores during this time period. Also Black (2003:53) stated, “Japanese wrecks in the Aleutian Chain, specifi cally in the Rat Islands, are well doc-umented for the 18th century. Specifi cally, on Am-chitka a Japanese ship was wrecked in 1784 with at least fi fteen survivors who spent the next three years living with or in close proximity with the Rat Islanders. Could such occurrences take place in earlier times? Such contacts, no matter how sporadic, would have resulted in some cultural transfers. No genetic connection with Japan needs to be postulated, though it cannot be ruled out al-together either.”

Black (2003:18, 53) mentions that Stephen Loring proposed “possible links” between the Western Aleutians and the Kurile Islands based on “new archaeological fi nds” on Agattu and Attu in the Near Islands and the Rat Islands. In Black’s book it is unclear what these similarities in art styles might be. Correspondence between Valery Shubin and Ben Fitzhugh shared with the authors revealed that rock art is currently unknown on ei-ther the Kurile Islands or Kamchatka (Fitz hugh, University of Washington, personal communica-tion 2002). Petroglyphs were recorded on the Chu-kotka Peninsula, but according to Dikov (1971) the engravings are representational rather than ab-stract, and depict boats, deer, whales and other sea mammals, and human fi gures apparently wearing mushrooms.

The Alaska Current fl ows north around the west coast of Attu. The Bering Current fl ows east on the north side of the Near Islands. The weaker currents would have made it relatively easy for people traveling from the south or west by boat to land on Agattu’s shores. Although we cannot rule out that peoples from Asia may have infl uenced western Aleut art, we simply do not know because the only known engravings from Asia do not resemble the Agattu art in either form or subject.

Anthropomorphic carvings in ivory and bone are found in the eastern and central Aleu-tians (Black 2003:24–29, 35, 46, 55–56). No evi-dence exists that eastern Aleuts practiced parietal art, but rock art, representing anthromorphs, faces, masks, whales, spirals, and stars, is found on Ko-diak (Knebel 2003). The eastern and central Aleu-tians anthropomorphic motifs and Kodiak parietal art technique might suggest an east to west move-ment infl uencing the artist/s who created the Gil-lon Point petroglyphs.

Why Gillon Point?That Aleuts were masters of art forms is refl ected in their art mobilier—artistic skill refl ected in thou-sands of bone and ivory artifacts recovered from ar-chaeological sites across the archipelago The im-agery on their three-dimensional implements and weapons makes reference to links between hu-mans, animals, the environment, and the spiritual world (see Black 2003). Like art mobilier, the pa-rietal engravings probably also represent a similar symbolic link between humans and the natural and spiritual worlds. Veniaminov (1984:218), describ-ing eastern Aleut belief systems, reported,

They had no temples or idols, but there were holy [sacred] or interdicted localities known as auda-gadax and also offerings to invisible spirits. The fi rst were at every village and where some mound or kerkur [an off-shore rock] or some outstanding feature, on a cliff, which were strictly prohibited to all women and young men. . . . Old and ma-ture men could visit these spots at certain times but only for the purpose of making offerings. . . . These were brought to the [interdicted, sacred places] with certain small-scale rites accompanied by petitions for assistance in [infl icting] vengeance on enemies or for success in hunting. . . . There was no prescribed place for this kind of offering, except that it never was made in the village or in an enclosed place.

The Agattu coastline at Gillon Point might have served as such a ritualistic place. Because of their location, the engravings might have a rela-tionship to the modern sea lion rookery. Prehis-toric art is often viewed as a form of magic used to increase prey animal fertility or entice animals. Sea lion rookeries and haulouts are fairly perma-nent with the animals returning to the same birth-ing location for centuries (Ban 2005; Lyman 1988). Were the images carved to invoke the sea lion, a common Aleut prey species (Lefèvre et al. 1997; Veniaminov 1984) to return each year to Gillon Point? If there is an association between the petro-glyphs and sea lion fertility, might this art occur at other rookeries with boulder, rather than sand, beaches? Because rookeries are protected, wild-life biologists are the most likely candidates to dis-cover future petroglyphs, if, indeed, petroglyphs are associated with sea lion fertility in the Aleu-tian chain. On the other hand, because the im-ages frequently depict human female genitalia, the images might simply depict fertility in a general sense.

Richard Bland (2010:23, 29) points out that petroglyphs “certainly meant something to the art-ists and their communities” but “make little sense to the modern viewer.” It remains unclear who cre-ated the Gillon Point petroglyphs, when they were created, and what they actually meant to the artist/s

West et al. : Petroglyphs from the Aleutian Islands 23

and community. Did a single person or several ex-ecute the images? Do the images represent art ren-dered in a lifetime or over a century or longer? It is currently impossible to date the images, and lacking an accurate location map showing the relationship of the petroglyphs to each other and to the erosion associated with the sea, it is impossible to deter-mine if the extreme weathering on some fi gures is caused by time or by proximity to ocean waves.

That Jochelson’s Aleut informant apparently knew the name of the “shaman” who created the art might indicate that the petroglyphs were cre-ated relatively recently—perhaps during the nine-teenth century. Is there a chronological sequence to the images? Were ovals pecked at the same time, before, or after the rectangles? Again, a site map that shows the relationship of the different fi g-ures to each other and their proximity to the sea or bluff edge would be extremely helpful.

Are the petroglyphs associated with the Aleut village located on the Gillon Point bluff? Future excavations at archaeological site ATU-032 on the Gillon Point bluff might reveal carved bone or ivory objects or stone slabs with motifs similar to those found on the Gillon Point shoreline. The au-thors raise more questions than we have answered. Clearly, the discovery or parietal art in the Western Aleutians provides a new dimension to Aleutian art as a whole. It is now known that parietal as well as portable art was practiced in the Aleutian Is-lands. The apparent lack of a suitable canvas for ex-ecution of rock art might be the reason for its rarity.

Acknowledgments. This research was supported with a grant (# 9604472) from the National Sci-ence Foundation, Offi ce of Polar Programs, Arctic Social Sciences. Exploration of the far western Aleutians was facilitated by the National Maritime Refuge ship Tiglax and the National Science Foun-dation vessel Alpha Helix. Our sincerest gratitude goes to Dr. Tom Loughlin, National Marine Fisher-ies Service, for documenting the rock art in the protected sea lion rookery zone. Much apprecia-tion goes to Mr. Matt O’Leary of the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs who provided valuable information for this paper.

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