Kondoa Rock-Art Sites World Heritage Site

Official name

Kondoa Rock-Art Sites | UNESCO

Country

Tanzania | Map

Continent

Africa

Location

Region Dodoma, District Kondoa
-4.7244° Lat, 35.8338° Lon | Map

Code

1183

Time Zone

Africa/Dar_es_Salaam (EAT, +0300)

Current Time

Category

Cultural

Description

Inscribed 2006. On the eastern slopes of the Masai escarpment bordering the Great Rift Valley are natural rock shelters, overhanging slabs of sedimentary rocks fragmented by rift faults, whose vertical planes have been used for rock paintings for at least two millennia. The spectacular collection of images from over 150 shelters over 2,336 km 2 , many with high artistic value, displays sequences that provide a unique testimony to the changing socio-economic base of the area from hunter-gatherer to agro-pastoralist, and the beliefs and ideas associated with the different societies. Some of the shelters are still considered to have ritual associations with the people who live nearby, reflecting their beliefs, rituals and cosmological traditions.