Rock Art and Archaeological Site Etiquette (good manners)
Be aware of your surroundings when you are outdoors. Here is a list of how you can protect your heritage.
When visiting ruins or other sites:
Prehistoric walls of ruins are very fragile, your weight may be all it takes to bring the wall down into a pile of rubble. Disturbing rocks in the wall can allow moisture to seep into the cracks, eroding the walls from the inside out, until they fall.
Rock circles or alignments are trying to tell a story. Moving them closes the book without anyone having a chance to interpret what they meant.
Walk lightly across desert pavement where your tracks could cause disturbance to ancient paths.
If you spot an object or archaeological interest, stop and examine it, even photograph it. When you finish, return it to where you found it.
Ruins are sacred places today just as they were hundreds of years ago. Conducting personal ceremonies and leaving objects in the ruins can be offensive to other visitors and to tribal members who may still be using the places for their own traditional ceremonies.
Protecting Rock Art: Six things that can damage or destroy the glyphs:
Touching rock art will leave oils from your fingers that speed the rock's natural deterioration process.
paper rubbings or tracings cause irreparable damage.
Chalking outlines make it impossible to use new methods of dating the figures.
Re-pecking or repainting an image does not restore it, but rather destroys the original.
Taking it home is illegal.
Graffiti is destructive and can destroy rock art, as well as deface historic wood buildings.
Please respect our past cultures. Now go and enjoy! Here are some other suggestions from the National Park Service,
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Adapted from Welcome to Arizona's Past