Researchers made these finds in the backcountry of Wupatki National Monument northeast of Flagstaff, which includes the ruins of dozens of sites built by Ancestral Puebloans known as the Kayenta and the Sinagua.

Experts with the Museum of Northern Arizona [MNA] and the National Park Service set out to explore the isolated reaches of the monument in 2014, in order to document the full extent of the rock art and other features that scientists had not studied in decades or, in many cases, had never seen before.

“As a result of the current project, the NPS now has a complete library of photographic images of every panel, every element, and every feature [in the study area]”, said MNA’s David Purcell, who supervised the study.

“And we were able to expand the scope of the project … and conduct some pilot analysis of how the rock art is oriented to the horizons, and conduct detailed additional documentation of the solar calendars.”

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