As with Devils Rock (Burragurra) about six kilometres to the north, Frying Pan Rock is a significant and complex Aboriginal engraving site. It is one of only four engraving sites in the Greater Blue Mountains with over a hundred figures (the average number being ten). Frying Pan Rock was first documented by W.J. Enright in 1898 in “Aboriginal rock carvings in the Wollombi district”, who must have had poor lighting as he only documented and sketched a small number of the many figures:
In consequence of the erosion by the action of water many figures formerly carved on the rock have almost entirely disappeared, a line here and there only pointing to their former existence; and the outlines of the two figures of men shown here have disappeared. Both figures are apparently in the act of dancing, and one of them has some kind of ornament on the head which may possibly be intended to represent the feathers with which the aborigines occasionally adorn their heads when indulging in a corroboree.
W.J. Enright
After the very crude sketches by Enright (figures 1-4 above are from Frying Pan Rock, and 5-7 from Devils Rock), Ian Sim produced a much more detailed sketch of the site in 1966, in which he identified 139 figures in total that he described in two groups. Fred McCarthy later used this as the basis for his very detailed descriptions of the figures.
Human head
Head with eyes, possibly an unfinished figure
Three echidnas
Set of 3 echidna
Boomerang and Club
"Deeply angled returning boomerang" and a spheroidal headed club.
Bandicoot
Woman
Two Men
Kangaroo Head
Large Man
Large kangaroo
Kangaroo
Kangaroo
Kangaroo
Kangaroo
Kangaroo
Speared Kangaroo
Kangaroo
Small Man with Sprear
A small man whose "arm continues as a spearthrower with hooked end in profile... he has thrown the spear into the big kangaroo"
Speared Kangaroo
Kangaroo
Koala or Wombat
Kangaroo
This first group of Frying Pan Rock engravings has six kangaroos, a line of ten kangaroo tracks and 44 emu tracks, in what McCarthy documented as a kangaroo hunt…
…in which a little man has speared a large kangaroo, as in the cave and bark paintings of Arnhem Land and adjacent islands, and in the Cobar pediplain paintings of NSW and he is sexually excited as a result; the tracks of the kangaroo lead to where it was speared; the other scattered emu and kangaroo tracks indicate that this was a favoured stopping place and its vicinity a good hunting area; the set of bird tracks in the middle of the group indicate a nesting place or waterhole where the bird faced in different directions; the dual kangaroo and emu theme is again illustrated, and the spearthrower is a rare figure.
This first group of engravings has five kangaroos in an east to west line, starting with “a leaping pair with the rear one’s forepart above the front one’s tail”.
The next kangaroo in the line is 5’6″ long with a “concave head, rounded face, 1 eye, 2 short rounded ears, medium width body with hump over hind quarters, convex belly, straight conical foreleg sloped backward”.
The last two kangaroos are next to each other; one of them is “a well posed and massive animal though ill proportioned with the body much too wide in the hind quarter” has been speared in the back. The other is a “very well proportioned and posed animal with some animation”.
Between the third kangaroo and the final pair is an unusual figure – a small man whose “arm continues as a spearthrower [womerah] with hooked end in profile… he has thrown the spear into the big kangaroo”.
McCarthy also described the second group of figures as a hunting composition, starting with this group of three small men (one of them incomplete) and three kangaroos, one of which is very large. A sinuous figure resembling a snake is in front of the big kangaroo’s head.
the two, and possibly three kangaroo hunts, the emu hunt and and lines of emu tracks, and the other mammals – bandicoot, echidna and wombat – and the goanna, all indicators that this area was a favoured and rewarding one for food, with the dual kangaroo-emu there again included; the set of three echidna and 2 weapons suggest that the hunter dropped his weapons on the ground in catching of after killing the echidna; the woman may have some association with the big man, who looks like a wrestler, who is evidently a ceremonial or a dancing, even a mythological, figure, but he is a unique human type in the engravings.
A pair of men both have upraised arms and “half oval heads”.
Next to the men is a kangaroo head, an unusual motif or an unfinished figure.
A woman is depicted with “tall, half oval head tilted to her right, no eyes or neck, round ended breasts projecting downward from her armpits, straight and truncated arms upraised, slightly concave sided body continuing down straight legs wide apart, convex and round ended feet outward, no genitalia”.
A larger man (5’6″ tall) has an unusual posture, with his arms curved closely over his head. He has six fingers on each hand and a “big narrow oval penis attached to outline of crutch”.
Near the middle of the platform are three echidnas: “the leading one 22” long, high arched back, rounded ends of body, pointed finlike head, tail and legs, no eyes.
Below the echidna are a “deeply angled returning boomerang” and a spheroidal headed club.
A bandicoot has a “2′ long with a conical head, no eyes, 2 pointed ears, neck, hump over hind quarters, flat belly, finlike legs, vertical, male, short tail”.
Near a shallow pothole is what Sim described as a koala or wombat, and McCarthy as a wombat “forward, standing with its body slightly upward and its fore feet off the ground”.
At the very southern end on an adjacent rock are two more kangaroos, which have a similar shape – both “landing on their hind feet in a leap with their heads forward and their bodies upward”. The lower kangaroo has a spear in its back.
This dog-like figure, possibly a dingo, does not appear to have been recorded by Sim or McCarthy.
A separate rock platform about fifty metres to the east of Frying Pan Rock has a head with eyes, possibly an unfinished figure, and a goanna.
Running across Frying Pan Rock in multiple directions are at least 94 animal tracks, including those of birds, emus and kangaroos.
The kangaroo tracks show the paired hind feet of these macropods; the points of the hind feet indicate the direction of travel.
Emu tracks and bird tracks are fairly similar with three forward‑pointing toes, but emu prints are larger and often more deeply engraved.
Waterholes and Grinding Grooves
Frying Pan Rock has a number of deep potholes, some covered by rock “lids”.
At the western end of Frying Pan Rock is a pothole with 35 axe grinding grooves.
Getting to Frying Pan Rock engraving site
The Frying Pan Rock engraving site is 14km along the Boree Track from Boree Valley Road; the conditions of the unsealed road varies but usually requires a 4WD. From the junction of the Boree Track and Frying Pan Rock Trail a very short walk or drive takes you to a turning circle and camping area.
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