Rock Art Styles

Former director of the Texas Memorial Museum Dr. W. W. Newcomb divided Lower Pecos rock art into four different styles:

• The Pecos River Style- The earliest style was multicolored and many shamans are shown in a transformation state. This style dates to the Middle Archaic period, 2500-6000 years ago (1500-4000 B.C.)
• The Red Linear Style- Small red stick figures depicting actions like everyday events or fertility rites have been found at several sites. It is not well dated, but believed to date to the latter part of the Late Archaic period, perhaps about 1300-1500 years ago (A.D. 500-700)
• The Red Monochrome Style- Pictographs are usually painted in red tones. Humans have their hands in the "hold up" position. Bows and arrows are shown indicating a time after A.D. 900.
• The Historical Style- Subjects such as horses, Europeans, churches, guns, and vaqueros lassoing longhorns indicate that this art was made after Europeans came into Mexico and Texas around A.D. 1600.

These styles are useful for organization and comparison and are still in use today, but researchers continue to make finer distinctions. Marvin Rowe and his students at Texas A&M University have developed techniques of getting direct radiocarbon dates from tiny fragments of the actual paint from rock art panels. This work will eventually lead to a much better understanding of how rock art styles evolved through time.