An Aboriginal engraving site documented by Ian Sim in two groups, or series, these two adjoining rock platforms near Myoora Road in Somersby have a total of 19 figures.
Casual figures of animals sought for food including fish, snakes and birds; the man with the three weapons is unique because of the placement of the two on his left side, the large fish is beautifully proportioned and the neckless bird is an unusual figure.
Series 1
At the top of the rock platform is a man holding a non-returning boomerang, with a broad sword club extending from his waist-belt to his knee over a narrow returning boomerang. Half the man is now covered by mud and vegetation; the photo below-right was taken by Bob Pankhurst during a severe droughtm when the entire figure was visible.
You can still see the broad sword club below the man’s arm.
Below the man are number of weathed figures; the largest are two eels or snakes: McCarthy described them as “elongate figures”.
Near these figures is a small eel.
Near the eels/snakes is a weathered fish, and a line of three “slender fishes” in a row near the edge of the rock platform.
Series 2
The adjoining rock platform has what was documented by Sim as a “headless standing bird” and by McCarthy as a “Standing bird [with] pointed head, no eyes or neck”. The figure has been vandalised and a neck and head added – it looks both unusual in style (Bob Pankhurst describes it as resembling the TV character “Ossie Ostrich”) and the grooves are clearly not pecked.
Near Ossie Ostrich is a large oval-bodied fish.
The last figure at the top of the rock platform is another standing bird.
There are two sets of grinding grooves but they have been covered by mud and silt; the two grooves below are near the middle of the site (photo by Bob Pankhurst).
Pankhurst also documented and photographed a figure he described as a platypus, which was not included in Sim’s recording.
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