Nine centimetres tall and hiding in plain sight: southern Africa's first stenciled rock art

Rock shelters in Mpumalanga have been studied for generations — and still kept a secret. David Pearce of the University of the Witwatersrand and Kiah Johnson of Cambridge have identified two humanlike figures, just 9 centimetres (3.5 inches) tall, at the La Rochelle rock shelter, made not by hand-painting but with a purpose-made stencil — a technique rare anywhere in the world and never before documented in southern Africa. Finding them took no expedition: the art was there all along, waiting for someone to look with the right question. The study appears in the South African Archaeological Bulletin.