What can ancient rock art -particularly intricately painted slender figures with corpulent vulvas and in active stances - say to us today? This interpretive study examines motifs pertaining to powerful female figures depicted in rock art unique to Arnhem Land, Australia, and the convergence of these motifs in mythology and ritual activity. Margaret collaborates in her work with Australian Aboriginal elders, guides, art historians, artists, and storytellers. Reading the often dancing or ecstatic figures as portraits of individual clan women in ritual postures, and noting the likelihood of the celebration of blood flow in the depictions, she suggests they speak of a oneness with the cosmogenic cycle of the universe. These patterns are lived by the Aboriginal people, repeated in the seasonal fecundity of the land, and celebrated as sacred in the religious belief system of the area. This work informs contemporary thinking about gender relationships in prehistoric Australia and emphasizes the high status of women at that time.

Ph.D. Dissertation

Margaret (Peggy) Grove is an independent researcher and cultural historian whose publications include Myths, Glyphs, and Rituals of a Living Goddess Tradition, ReVision Magazine, Winter 1999. She has participated in panels on Collaborative Research at the International Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences Conference at William and Mary College in Williamsburg, VA and at the Women's Conference in Albuquerque, NM, and will present a paper at the International Australian Rock Art Congress in Alice Springs, Australia in July, 2000. Peggy currently is writing a book entitled Dance of Gender and guest lectures at California College of Arts and Crafts, Mills College, and New College.