{"it":{"id":"W17A04","kind":"artifact","sub":"Authenticated","name":"Tassili Great Martian God (Jabbaren round-head painting)","place":"in situ, Jabbaren shelter ceiling, Tassili n'Ajjer (Algeria) [site AFR-TAS]","mat":"pigment on sandstone","dims":"6 x 3 m (fjexp); ~6 m (wunderkammer); >18 ft (von Daniken)","loc":"in situ, Jabbaren shelter ceiling, Tassili n'Ajjer (Algeria) [site AFR-TAS]","acc":"n/a","find":"Jabbaren found 1938 (Brenans/Lhote); named by Henri Lhote 1956","flag":"genuine rock art","src":[193,194,195,436],"tags":[],"sum":"Lie on your back in a rock shelter at Jabbaren and it fills the ceiling above you: a giant figure 6 m tall and 3 m wide, with a round, featureless head. It is the largest single painting on the Tassili plateau of southeastern Algeria, about 2 km from the usual camp along Wadi Amazar.\n\nThe French explorer Henri Lhote copied the art of these shelters, and his team found several hundred painted walls with many thousands of pictures. This figure belongs to what researchers call the Round Head period, named for exactly this kind of smooth, rounded head.\n\nThe hard part is the head: round, smooth and faceless, on a body painted taller than any person.\n\nErich von Däniken, in Chariots of the Gods, called this the 'great god Mars' and described it as a figure in a 'diver's suit', more than 18 feet high, with lines that suggested scaffolding to him and spirals he read as antennae. He set it beside rock art from Tulare, California. The painting answers some of this itself: it is a shelter-ceiling image in the Round Head style found across the plateau's shelters, and a round head with no face is that style's signature, not a helmet. Masks, ritual dress and figures from belief all fit what the painters chose to show.\n\nWhat no one can yet say is who these painted beings were to the people below them, lying, as we do now, looking up.","why":"The best-known 'ancient astronaut' painting, shown in its real setting and style.","nfacts":4,"nsrc":7,"yt":"Compare with masked figures nearby.","rel":["AFR-TAS"],"hook":"Painted 6 m tall across a rock ceiling, its round blank head was called a Martian god. Here is what it is."},"S":{"193":["FJ Expeditions: Jabbaren (Tassili) site notes","http://www.fjexpeditions.com/tassili/jabbaren/jabbaren.html"],"194":["Wunderkammer der Kulturgeschichte 2019: Marsmenschen in der Sahara? (cites Lhote 1959 fig. 21)","http://wunderkammer.inselmann.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/WK.LI_2019_Marsmenschen-in-der-Sahara.pdf"],"195":["Wikipedia Tassili n'Ajjer","https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tassili_n'Ajjer&oldid=1381094515"],"436":["Wikipedia: Henri Lhote","https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Lhote"]},"rec":{"id":"W17A04","alias":[],"ms":[{"a":"painting size","v":"6 x 3","u":"m","unc":"","by":"FJ Expeditions","yr":"","m":"field guide","b":"S","t":"MEASUREMENT","id":"W17M015","s":["W17S12"],"c":"FJ Expeditions: Jabbaren (Tassili) site notes","url":"http://www.fjexpeditions.com/tassili/jabbaren/jabbaren.html"},{"a":"painting size","v":"approx 6","u":"m","unc":"approx","by":"Wunderkammer","yr":"2019","m":"after Lhote 1959 fig.21","b":"S","t":"MEASUREMENT","id":"W17M016","s":["W17S13"],"c":"Wunderkammer der Kulturgeschichte 2019: Marsmenschen in der Sahara? (cites Lhote 1959 fig. 21)","url":"http://wunderkammer.inselmann.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/WK.LI_2019_Marsmenschen-in-der-Sahara.pdf"},{"a":"original height (claimed)","v":"more than 18","u":"ft","unc":"","by":"E. von Daniken","yr":"1968","m":"claimant statement attributed to Lhote","b":"S","t":"MEASUREMENT","id":"W17M017","s":["W17S17"],"c":"von Daniken, Chariots of the Gods? English pb (Internet Archive OCR full text; saved prim/chariots_ia.txt)","url":"https://archive.org/download/chariots_of_the_gods/chariots_of_the_gods1_djvu.txt"},{"a":"height of large Jabbaren round-head figure","v":"some eighteen","u":"ft","unc":"approx (\"some\")","by":"Henri Lhote (ch. \"Jabbaren with its Five Thousand Figures\", pp.69-70)","yr":"1956-57","m":"expedition observation","b":"S","t":"MEASUREMENT","id":"W18M001","s":["W18S10"],"c":"Lhote, The Search for the Tassili Frescoes (Eng. 1959; IA OCR; saved prim/lhote1959.txt)","url":"https://archive.org/download/HenriLhoteTheSearchForTheTassiliFrescoesTheStoryOfThePrehistoricRockPaintingOfTheSahara1959/Henri-Lhote-The-search-for-the-Tassili-frescoes-the-story-of-the-prehistoric-rock-painting-of-the-sahara-1959_djvu.txt"}],"lab":[{"k":"Lab test","mat":"dating (Tassili art)","v":"earliest presumed ~12,000 yr; most 9th-10th millennium BP or younger (OSL of associated sediments)","m":"OSL","by":"via wiki","b":"S","s":["W17S07"],"url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tassili_n'Ajjer&oldid=1381094515"}],"eng":[],"ori":[],"gaps":[{"a":"museum_accession","r":"not in staged/legacy artifact record (free sources)"}],"dat":[],"aa":[],"ac":[],"me":[],"ci":[{"who":"Erich von Daniken","med":"book","ep":"Chariots of the Gods? (Eng. pb, IA scan), ch.3 (TOC p.13)","v":"Being in a kind of diver's suit; \"great god Mars\" >18 ft high","b":"S","s":["W17S17"]},{"who":"Erich von Daniken","med":"book","ep":"Return to the Stars / Gods from Outer Space (IA scan), ch.5 \"The Sphere the Ideal Shape for Space-craft\"","v":"Sphere with open hatch and TV aerial; figures in suits with antenna helmets","b":"S","s":["W18S13"]}],"cq":[],"sd":[],"art":{"claimed_anomaly":"Being in a diver/space suit","mainstream_reading":"Round Head period rock art; Lhote label evocative; Lhote team accused of faking/damaging images","provenance_flag":"genuine rock art","current_location":"in situ, Jabbaren shelter ceiling, Tassili n'Ajjer (Algeria) [site AFR-TAS]","find_circumstances":"Jabbaren found 1938 (Brenans/Lhote); named by Henri Lhote 1956","claimant":"Erich von Daniken (Chariots of the Gods?, ch.3)","status":"supported-explained","dimensions":"6 x 3 m (fjexp); ~6 m (wunderkammer); >18 ft (von Daniken)","material":"pigment on sandstone","date":"","culture":"","museum_accession":"n/a","b":"V","s":["W17S12","W17S13","W17S07"]},"sub":[],"src":[{"id":"W17S12","t":"FJ Expeditions: Jabbaren (Tassili) site notes","u":"http://www.fjexpeditions.com/tassili/jabbaren/jabbaren.html"},{"id":"W17S13","t":"Wunderkammer der Kulturgeschichte 2019: Marsmenschen in der Sahara? (cites Lhote 1959 fig. 21)","u":"http://wunderkammer.inselmann.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/WK.LI_2019_Marsmenschen-in-der-Sahara.pdf"},{"id":"W17S17","t":"von Daniken, Chariots of the Gods? English pb (Internet Archive OCR full text; saved prim/chariots_ia.txt)","u":"https://archive.org/download/chariots_of_the_gods/chariots_of_the_gods1_djvu.txt"},{"id":"W18S10","t":"Lhote, The Search for the Tassili Frescoes (Eng. 1959; IA OCR; saved prim/lhote1959.txt)","u":"https://archive.org/download/HenriLhoteTheSearchForTheTassiliFrescoesTheStoryOfThePrehistoricRockPaintingOfTheSahara1959/Henri-Lhote-The-search-for-the-Tassili-frescoes-the-story-of-the-prehistoric-rock-painting-of-the-sahara-1959_djvu.txt"},{"id":"W17S07","t":"via wiki","u":"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tassili_n'Ajjer&oldid=1381094515"},{"id":"W18S13","t":"von Daniken, Return to the Stars / Gods from Outer Space (IA OCR; saved prim/godsfromouterspace...txt)","u":"https://archive.org/download/godsfromouterspacereturntothestarsorevidencefortheimpossiblebyvondanikenerich/Gods%20From%20Outer%20Space%2C%20Return%20to%20the%20Stars%20or%20Evidence%20for%20the%20Impossible%20by%20von%20Daniken%20Erich_djvu.txt"},{"id":null,"t":"Wikipedia: Henri Lhote","u":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Lhote"},{"id":"VW17A04-8","t":"FJ Expeditions: Jabbaren, Tassili n’Ajjer","u":"https://fjexpeditions.com/tassili/jabbaren/jabbaren.html"},{"id":"VW17A04-9","t":"von Däniken, Chariots of the Gods: Unsolved Mysteries of the Past (Internet Archive)","u":"https://archive.org/details/erich-von-daniken-chariots-of-the-gods-unsolved-mysteries-of-the-past-pdfdrive"}],"qs":["A round, faceless head is the signature of a whole style here. Does that settle it, or does it make it stranger?","Lhote's copies made these paintings famous. How much should we trust copies over photographs of the rock?","The Sahara was green when this was painted. What else might lie hidden under deserts today?"]},"img":null,"md":{"h":"img/m/W17A04-16x9.webp","w":1600,"hh":900,"alt":"Tassili Great Martian God (Jabbaren round-head painting), in situ, Jabbaren shelter ceiling, Tassili n'Ajjer (Algeria) [site AFR-TAS] — Jabbaren Rock Art in the style of bovine herders. A tribe on the move. The oxen carry the women and children, as well…","by":"Gruban","lic":"CC BY-SA 2.0","lu":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0","p":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Algerien_5_0049.jpg","g":false,"ct":false,"cap":"","sec":[]},"hh":[{"v":"6 x 3 m","h":"Recorded dimensions: 6 x 3 m (fjexp); ~6 m (wunderkammer); >18 ft (von Daniken)","s":[266]},{"v":"Pigment on sandstone","h":"Made of","s":[266]},{"v":"Jabbaren found 1938","h":"Where it was found: Jabbaren found 1938 (Brenans/Lhote); named by Henri Lhote 1956","s":[266]},{"v":"in situ","h":"Held at: in situ, Jabbaren shelter ceiling, Tassili n'Ajjer (Algeria) [site AFR-TAS]","s":[266]}],"hs":{"266":["FJ Expeditions: Jabbaren (Tassili) site notes","http://www.fjexpeditions.com/tassili/jabbaren/jabbaren.html"]}}