The Village of Nomadic Birds

"The Village of the Nomadic Birds"


5x7 oil on gessoboard




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#22

Old stones,relics,bones,ruins and Jewelry have provided us with a rich tapestry of the lives this ancient culture once lived. We know now from the layers of sediment in the hillsides that this valley was prone to flooding with the yearly monsoons. More importantly it looks as though this region had a major flood every century or so. Archaeologists now believe that the bird centered idol worship originated in the birds ability to fly away from the floods, only retuning to mate and feed once the waters had receded. To the ancient society that inhabited this land, the birds nomadic ability appeared to be a magical gift.
The only evidence of this society's great alters are the enormous 100 ton granite bird heads which litter the countryside. It is thought that the reason for the heads being left relatively unmolested is that for the ancient peoples, to damage the image of the birds face in any way was to bring about bad tidings to family and self. Archaeologists are uncertain of how exactly they did it, but the peoples of the time somehow managed to fell the enormous statues ( without any obvious or overt damage to the faces) of the birds and harvest the granite to build neighboring villages.
It would seem that through the building of inland towns with the granite from the bird idols, the prophecy of the Nomadic birds held true. In watching and idealizing the nomadic nature of the local birds the people managed to build an inland society and thereby survive the local regions propensity for flooding.