International Conference What Ever Happened to the People? Humans and Anthropomorphs in the Rock Art of Northern Africa Royal Academy for Overseas Sciences Brussels, 17-19 September, 2015 Fat Ladies, Thin Men, Blobby People, and Body Parts: An Exploration of Human Representations in the Rock Art of the North Kharga Basin by Salima Ikram * Keywords. — Egypt; Kharga Oasis; Animals; Hand; Foot; Genitalia. Summary. — As with most other places in the world, rock art images of animals found in the North Kharga Oasis (in Egypt’s western desert) outnumber those of humans. This paper explores the range of human im- agery from this region, excluding, for the most part, those dating to the Pharaonic period and speculates as to their signiicance. Introduction Everywhere in the eastern Sahara, prior to the Pharaonic period, images of animals in rock art far outweigh those of humans. This situation mimics that in most of the world. Scholars have interpreted these depictions of animals in a variety of ways: living freely in the wild, being trapped or corralled, being killed during a hunt or dying, pierced with arrows or spears, with the agents of their deaths remaining entirely invisible. This imbal- ance of imagery has led to the question that is the subject of the conference regarding the place of people in rock art. Despite the absence of pictured humans, the mere act of creating an image declares their presence, as they are the agents of creation. Through their action, they might be expressing their beliefs, aesthetics, and personality, as well as manifesting some sort of interaction with or control of their environment. Such control could be metaphorical/magical over the animals they depicted, or a landscape that is altered by the placement of the images, or the messages transmitted by these images between diferent individuals or groups. Thus, whether they themselves are pictured or not, wherever there is rock art humans are omnipresent. The American University in Cairo’s North Kharga Oasis Darb Ain Amur Survey (NKODAAS) has been working in the western part of the Kharga basin since 2007 [1] ** , recording hitherto unidentiied archaeologi- cal material, including several rock art sites (Ikram 2009a, b, 2012; Bunbury & Ikram 2014; Rossi & Ikram 2012). It is well established that rock art is hard to date; however, in many instances in Egypt images of the Pharaonic period (c. 3000 BC-30 BC), particularly those forming part of an ‘oicial’ iconography, can be separated from earlier drawings. These will not form a signiicant part of this paper as their interpretation its into the established iconographic and literary traditions of the Dynastic era. However, there is always some obfuscation of chronological divides, particularly when dealing with body parts rather than entire igures, as the former are often featured in rock art of many eras. Unfortunately, so far, within the area of the NKODAAS concession, there are insuicient images recorded that might provide a clear guide to chronology based on superpositioning or style. * SAPE, American University in Cairo, AUC Avenue, Tagammu 5, New Cairo 11835 (Egypt). ** Numbers in brackets [ ] refer to the notes, pp. ?? pp.??-?? rock art 2018_01_08.indd 353 09-01-18 09:58:48