The Tsisab Ravine and other Brandberg Sites (Limited editon: 26 copies)

Series: The Rock Paintings of Southern Africa: Vol. 3
The Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation
Trianon Press
Clairvaux, 1959
Original cloth gilt and dust jacket, 29x38 cm, 77 plates, 50 photographs

Condition:

3. Fair. Some single finger marks inside, dust jacked torn at the edges.
Extremly rare.

This is one of 26 copies marked from 'A' to 'Z' and bears the 'S'.

This copy has been a present to science fellow and co-author R. G. Strey by Abbé Henri Breuil and Mary E. Boyles. In the header of this book find the handwritten dedications of both:

- A mon ami R.G. Strey
En soutenir de votre dévouée et amical collaboration au Brandberg et a l'Erongo et a votre amical concours photographique
H. Breuil
de l'Institut de France 29 Novembre 1959

- In remembrance of all the help and companionship you gave us and our happy busy days togehter.
Mary E. Boyles

Not only an early documentation of Brandberg exploring, but a very personal remain of a member of the former exploration team, R. G. Strey.

Content:

The Tsisab Ravine in the Brandberg Mountain range of South-West Africa, which is the site of the famous 'White Lady of the Brandberg," is also the site of a great number of painted rock shelters clustered together nearby. This volume is the outcome of the labors of Abbe Breuil and his companions who camped in the Tsisab Ravine in 1947 and again in 1948 in order to study the sites and to take tracings directly from the rock face.

The Abbe's color copies are reproduced by the collotype and hand-stencil process in 77 plates, including one double-page, and are documented by 50 photographs reproduced in monochrome collotype, including two double-page photo-montages. It also includes introductory and topographical material, as well as a detailed description of the plates with the collaboration of Mary E. Boyle, Dr. E. R. Scherz and R. G. Strey.

THE TSISAB RAVINE in the Brandberg Mountain range of South-West Africa, which is the site of the famous 'White Lady of the Brandberg' (Volume I in this series), is also the site of a great number of painted rock shelters clustered together nearby.

These are described in the present volume. Unlike the 'White Lady', which depicts a single ceremonial procession, they show an amazing variety of subjects, ranging from some of the finest rock paintings of animals in Southern Africa to scenes of vivid human and ethnological interest —scenes as diverse as the woman 'taken in adultery' in Jochmann Shelter, the charming Hottentot musicians in the 'Girls' School', and the spectacle of Death dismembering his victims in Skeleton Shelter.

The Brandberg is not easily accessible and visitors are rare. In fact, the map of the mountain made in 1917 by the German surveyor Maack (who first discovered the 'White Lady') remained the only one in existence until 1955. Among the comparatively few white visitors to the region, the Abbé Breuil and his companions camped in the Tsisab Ravine in 1947 and again in 1948, in order to study the sites at first hand and to take tracings directly from the rock face.

The present volume is the outcome of their labours: the Abbé's colour copies are reproduced by the collotype and hand-stencil process in 77 plates, including one double-page, and are documented by 50 photographs reproduced in monochrome collotype, including two double-page photo-montages. The volume contains introductory and topographical material, as well as a detailed description of the plates.

In recent years expeditions have been made into the upper and western reaches of the Brandberg, resulting in the discovery of a number of painted rock sites, some of them extremely important. These are described in a separate chapter, and reproductions of 39 photographs and copies of the paintings are included.

This double volume is the third in a series incorporating the work done by the Abbé Breuil when, at the personal invitation of the late Field-Marshal Smuts, he visited South Africa during and after the war in order to undertake a first-hand survey of the prehistoric rock paintings of Southern Africa. These are among the richest and most varied records yet discovered of the life and art of early man.

Preface and Acknowledgments
Introduction

I. The Brandberg
II. Exploration of the Brandberg
III. My Three Visits to the Tsisab Ravine
IV. The 1948 Expedition
V. General Characteristics of the Tsisab Paintings
VI. Topography of the Sites
VII. Other Painted Sites in the Brandberg

Description of the Plates
Other Brandberg Sites

I. The Tsisab Ravine
II. The Numas, Naib and Amis Valleys
III. The High Brandberg: 1954 Expeditions
IV. The High Brandberg: 1955 Expedition

Appendix: Errata in Obermaier and Kühn
List of Illustrations
Colour Plates and Photographs

Maps
1. Southern Africa, with inset map of principal sites visited in South-West Africa
2. The Brandberg Mountain
3. The Tsisab Ravine