(Bishkek, 2001, 220 p., (in English) K.Tashbaeva, M. Khujanazarov, V. Ranov, Z. Samashev.
Editor - K.Tashbaeva).

This publication discusses such interesting area of archaeology as rock art (petroglyphs). Rock art is one of the most widespread, interesting and at the same time enigmatic monuments of ancient culture. They are almost omnipresent. Apart from their aesthetic value, they contain rich data on spiritual and material culture, religious concepts and cults, relationship between people and their world. At the same time rock drawings are the only source of research of the roots and development of ancient visual art.

This is the first book published in Central Asia that contains the main data on the most important collections of rock drawing in the whole region. It discusses the time of their creation, and interprets a lot of interesting themes and subjects. The book is well-illustrated. All this enables researches and those who are interested in rock art to examine various drawings and to track differences and common features of the rock drawings of mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan as well as of Kazakh and Uzbek steppes. One can compare the style and the technique of these drawings, scattered around the diverse landscape of Central Asia.

This publication will be interesting to all those who study rock art professionally and also to all those who take interest in the art of pre-historic and medieval population, its spiritual culture and understanding of the world.