Depiction of Pregnancy and Child Birth in Early Indian Rock Art: An Overview of Socio-Cultural Behaviour

Abstract

Rock art is an expression of human behaviour in a symbolic way. It is an assemblage of signs and symbols which are not easy to explain as they appear. Some of the symbols are very common worldwide like the symbols of procreation or fertility. These are present in art from palaeolithic art to modern art. Present research paper is a small attempt to highlight and decode these depictions like pregnancy, child birth and other scenes and symbols related to the theme in light of human’s biological, social and cultural behaviour. All kind of behaviour which are liable to bring individuals together, comes under social behaviour. Social behaviour is interaction of people to make the survival easy, it also includes cultural activities which can be seen as psychological support for survival. Reproduction is a part of human’s biological behaviour but it also builds social behaviour among people. Different steps of this process (reproduction) need social cooperation and psychological support which creates the basic structure of the society. In the present paper, through the study of rock art we will try to find out how the social and cultural behaviour of people in the past managed the evolutionary or biological problems of reproduction. © ARF India.