Educational interpretations of the rock art of the Cuevas Village of the Municipality of El Contadero, Department of Nariño (Colombia)

Interpretaciones etnográficas del arte rupestre de la Vereda Cuevas en el Municipio El Contadero, Departamento de Nariño (Colombia)

This article presents findings related to interpretations of the mea- ning of stone carvings, or petroglyphs, found in the Cuevas area of the municipality of El Contadero, Nariño, in southwestern Colombia. This area is home to the pre-Columbian Putisnán-Pastos people, where they left behind an important archaeological legacy that has prevai- led over time. Methodologically, this study was conducted between 2007 and 2009 using the hermeneutic ethnographic method, under a qualitative design. The subjects who provided the information were elderly residents of the Cuevas area and other areas surrounding the area where the petroglyphs are located. The results indicate that an interpretation of the pre-Columbian carvings in Putisnán is possible based on the analysis of Andean cosmovisional, cosmogonic, and cosmological principles interrelated with current local collective me- mory. It can be concluded that the interpretation of pre-Columbian writing is broad and, based on ethnographic and hermeneutic analy- sis, one can propose a possible conservation of certain structures of ancestral cultural knowledge that, due to colonial effects, have arrived transformed to the present.