Please comment on the significance of the deer antlers seen painted numerous times in the Fate Bell Triad panel.

The iconography of Pecos River style art is loaded with symbols that carry more than one meaning. A poet friend of mine appropriately describes the art as polyvalent (many values) because any one image can operate on several different levels. A case can be made for antlers functioning in the economic, mythological; and religious spheres. Deer were the largest game animal available to the hunters and gatherers of the Lower Pecos during the period the paintings were made. (The later appearance of bison is duly noted in the Red Linear and Historic pictographs, as well as in the petroglyphs.) Far more than just meat, deer provided hides for clothing, bones and antlers for tools, and various body parts for ornamentation and ritual. Among the latter are deer hoof rattles found in the dry rock shelter deposits. It is not unusual to elevate an economically important animal to the pantheon of sacred spirits but deer have other attractive characteristics that are often featured mythologically. Fleetness and acute perception are valued qualities that were often adopted through the acquisition of deer as spirit helpers or familiars. Many native people still living in northern Mexico revere deer. Many of their rituals revolve around deer, including dances that faithfully mimic their dainty movements and extreme agility. The dancers often masquerade as deer by wearing hides and antlers, as well as hoof rattles. The percussive clacking together of sticks represents the sound of colliding antlers. Antler headdresses have been found archeologically in Coahuilan burial caves, implying that the paraphernalia illustrated in the rock art has some basis in reality. On a superficial level then, these shamans mimic their spirit animal by wearing antlers but these same antlers convey to the bearer the agility and sharp senses of the deer. At Fate Bell, a symbolic cornucopia combines the antlers with the wings of a bird (spiritual flight), reminding us of the Siberian juxtaposition of sky and earth represented by birds and deer. On yet another level, our ancestors - and all of us descend from hunting and gathering people, it is just a matter of when and how far one fell from the tree - were astute observers of the cyclical rhythms in nature, including the growth, shedding, and regrowth of antlers. Recalling that in the shamanic universe, the symbolic death of the shaman is followed by his rebirth from his bones - what more appropriate symbol for regeneration than antlers? Like those standard ingredients in witches'cookbooks, hair and fingernails, antlers seem to resist death. This belief is shown in many ways in Pecos River style art, for example, by the shaman figures with radiant hair, that signifies that they are entranced, thus invulnerable to spirit attach. Prehistorically, it finds validity in the burials where antlers are interred with the corpse. In one such grave (in San Antonio), the dead person was covered with antler racks that were piled over the chest and head. Throughout eternity, human beings have tried to figure out how to evade the finality of death. That spring follows winter has inspired many a sage to postulate life after death, reincarnation, or some sort of spirit survival. Osiris and Jesus are two examples of the belief in death and rebirth perpetuated in much more complex societies. The shaman in Fate Bell is telling us that he/she is using the supernatural deer to guide her/him to and from the spirit land, that like the antlers, the shaman will regenerate from the most enduring elements of his body, surviving spiritual death. Now if we could just figure out how that works……