Twyfelfontein, which means "uncertain spring" in Afrikaans, is officially called ǀUi-ǁAis in Damara andNama languages, meaning "jumping waterhole." It is a place with ancient rock carvings located in the Kunene Region of north-western Namibia. The site includes a spring in a valley surrounded by the sides of a sandstone table mountain that receives very little rain and experiences large differences in temperature between day and night.

People have lived at Twyfelfontein for about 6,000 years. Early inhabitants were hunter-gatherers, followed later by Khoikhoi herders. Both groups used the site for religious purposes and performed shamanist rituals there. These rituals led to the creation of at least 2,500 rock carvings and a few rock paintings. Twyfelfontein has one of the largest groups of rock petroglyphs in Africa. In 2007, UNESCO recognized it as Namibia's first World Heritage Site.

History

The Twyfelfontein valley has been home to Stone Age hunter-gatherers from the Wilton culture since about 6,000 years ago. These people created most of the carvings and likely all the paintings found there. Between 2,000 and 2,500 years ago, the Khoikhoi, an ethnic group related to the San people, lived in the valley. At that time, the valley was called ǀUi-ǁAis by the Damara/Nama people, meaning "jumping waterhole." The Khoikhoi also made rock art that is clearly different from the older carvings.

Europeans did not live in the area until after World War II, when a serious drought forced white Afrikaans-speaking farmers (called Boers) to move there. The government later took control of the land as part of the Odendaal Plan, making it part of the Damaraland bantustan. The white settlers left in 1965.

In 1921, topographer Reinhard Maack, who also discovered the White Lady rock painting at Brandberg, reported seeing rock carvings in the area. A more detailed study began in 1947 after David Levin studied the possibility of farming there. He rediscovered the spring but struggled to get enough water for his family and animals. He became unsure about the spring’s water supply, and an Afrikaans-speaking friend jokingly called him "David Twyfelfontein," meaning "David Doubts-the-spring." When Levin bought the land in 1948, he named it Twyfelfontein. The word "twyfel" more accurately means "questionable" or "uncertain" rather than "doubtful."

In 1950, scientific study of the rock art began with an investigation by Ernst Rudolph Scherz, who recorded over 2,500 carvings on 212 sandstone slabs. Today, experts estimate the site has more than 5,000 individual rock art images.

Location and description

Twyfelfontein is located in the southern Kunene Region of Namibia, an area once called Damaraland. The site is found along the banks of the Aba Huab River in the Huab valley of the Mount Etjo formation. The rocks with artwork are in a valley surrounded by the slopes of a sandstone table mountain. An underground water source, fed by a layer of rock that does not allow water to pass through, creates a spring in this dry area. The name Twyfelfontein means the spring itself, the valley where the spring is located, and also refers to a larger area with nearby tourist attractions, including rock engravings, the Organ Pipes, Burnt Mountain, Doros crater, and the Petrified Forest. The World Heritage Site includes the area with rock engravings.

This area is where different types of land meet, such as semi-desert, savanna, and shrubland. It receives less than 150 mm (5.9 in) of rain each year. Daily temperatures range from 10 to 28 °C (50 to 82 °F) in July and from 21 to 35 °C (70 to 95 °F) in November.

Twyfelfontein is 20 km (12 mi) south of the C39 major road between Sesfontein and Khorixas. It is connected by the district road D3214. The Twyfelfontein Country Lodge has a gravel airstrip. The lodge, campsite, visitor center, and most other tourist facilities are managed through a collaboration between the lodge owners and the Twyfelfontein-Uibasen Conservancy.

The rock art area includes fourteen smaller sites first identified by Scherz during his initial survey. These sites are still used to describe the locations of artworks in Twyfelfontein.

Artworks

Sandstone rocks at Twyfelfontein are covered by a hard layer called desert varnish, which is brown or dark grey. Engravings were made by carving through this layer to reveal the lighter rock underneath. These carvings were created over thousands of years. The oldest engravings are about 10,000 years old, and new works were likely made until around 1000 AD when pastoral tribes arrived. Three types of engravings can be found at Twyfelfontein:

• Iconic imagery (pictures of animals, humans, and mythical creatures)
• Pictograms (geometric patterns like circles and rows of dots)
• Indentations (areas used for daily tasks, such as grinding hollows, board games, and gong stones)

The site also has rock paintings in 13 locations, with images of humans painted in red ochre in six rock shelters. It is rare to find both rock paintings and engravings in the same place.

Hunter-gatherers created most of the iconic engravings and all the paintings. These carvings and paintings show animals like rhinoceroses, elephants, ostriches, and giraffes, as well as footprints of humans and animals. Some images, like the "Lion Man"—a lion with a long, bent tail ending in a six-toed footprint—suggest a transformation between humans and animals. These images, along with animal tracks, may have been part of spiritual ceremonies. Earlier ideas that these carvings only showed efforts to find food are now considered too simple.

Engravings of animals that did not live in the area, such as sea lions, penguins, and possibly flamingos, suggest hunter-gatherers may have traveled more than 100 km (62 mi) to the coast. A recent study by Sven Ouzman questions earlier claims about these animals, calling them "strange animals" that might actually be giraffes or other local species.

The Khoikhoi herders created the geometric engravings, which may represent their groups. They also made the practical indentations, such as grinding hollows and game boards. Some stones have marks from being used as gong stones, which make unusual sounds when struck.

Archaeology

The archaeological name of the site is Twyfelfontein 534. It is divided into 15 smaller sites, as described by Scherz in 1975. Objects found at the site include many stone tools, mostly made from quartzite. The types and shapes of these tools show that they were used for working with rock, as well as wood and leather. Artwork such as pendants and beads made from ostrich eggshell fragments has been found in several areas. Charcoal, bone fragments, and undecorated pottery fragments were also discovered. However, the pottery may have come from early farmers, not the Stone Age people who created the rock art.

The site's archaeological value is less important than its collection of rock art. The findings support the idea that the engravings may have a shamanist origin. This is because remains found at the site include bones from small animals like antelope, rock dassie, and lizards, not large animals shown in the artwork.

Site protection and recognition

On August 15, 1952, the area was named a National Monument by the South West African administration. Even though it was recognized early, the site had no protection until 1986, when it became a nature reserve. Because of this delay, many of the rock carvings were damaged or taken. Also, visitors sometimes added their own drawings on the sandstone rocks.

Under Namibian law, the site is now protected by Section 54 of the National Heritage Act. In 2007, UNESCO named Twyfelfontein as Namibia’s first World Heritage Site, calling it one of the largest collections of rock carvings in Africa. UNESCO noted that the site shows a clear and high-quality record of rituals from hunter-gatherer communities over at least two thousand years (criterion iii). It also recognized the connection between rituals and daily life near a water source (criterion V). Twyfelfontein remained Namibia’s only World Heritage Site until 2013, when the Namib Sand Sea was added.

To get UNESCO approval, Namibia created a buffer zone of 91.9 km (35.5 sq mi) to protect the area’s view. In the 0.6 km (0.2 sq mi) core area, grazing is not allowed, and tourism buildings are prohibited. Although Twyfelfontein is considered mostly intact, a lodge called Twyfelfontein Country Lodge near the "Zeremonienplatz" (Place of Ceremonies) rock engraving site in the buffer zone worries UNESCO. They said the lodge has seriously harmed the rock carvings in that area. A hiking trail allowed visitors to walk freely near the carvings, which was too close to many sites. Since becoming a World Heritage Site, management has improved, especially with visitor control. Unsupervised hiking is no longer allowed.

References and literature

• Ouzman, Sven. "Rock Art of Twyfelfontein, Namibia, Africa. Twyfelfontein Site Report." Bradshaw Foundation. Saved from the original on 21 October 2014. Retrieved on 4 August 2010.
• Scherz, Ernst-Rudolf. Felsbilder in Südwest-Afrika. Teil II: Die Gravierungen im Nordwesten Südwest-Afrikas [Rock Art in South-West Africa. Volume II: The engravings in north-western South West Africa] (in German). Published in 1975 by Böhlau Verlag, Cologne. ISBN 978-3-412-03374-3.
• Breunig, Peter. Archäologischer Reiseführer Namibia (in German). Published in 2014 by Africa Magna Verlag, Frankfurt a. M. ISBN 978-3-937248-39-4.