f these are found in close proximity to the Grand
Canon of the Colorado, and on the cliffs in which the far-famed cliff
dwellers of old took up their abode. Hieroglyphics, marked upon rocks or
other lasting substances, have been used by nearly all ancient races to
perpetuate the history of certain events among them. Especially true is
this of the ancient people who lived in Arizona. The remarkable picture
rocks and boulders, with strange symbols upon them, left by the
prehistoric races of Arizona, have been the cause of much discussion
among those who have seen them, as to who these ancient hieroglyphic
makers were. These rock records may be divided into three different
kinds, which it is thought were made by two different races. The first,
or very ancient race, left records on rocks, in some instances of
symbols only, and in other instances of pictures and symbols combined.
The later race, which came after the first race had vanished, made only
crude representations of animals, birds or reptiles, not using symbols
or combinations of lines.

The age of the most ancient pictographs and hieroglyphics can only be
conjectured, but all give certain indications that they are many
centuries old, and the difference between the work of the ancient and
the later race leads the observer to believe that the older
hieroglyphics were made by a people far superior to those who came after
them, and who left no record in symbols, as we have said, with the
exception of crude representations of animals and reptiles.

In many instances it is quite evident that the same rock or cliff has
been used by the two different races to put their markings upon, the
later, or inferior, race often making their pictographs over or across
the hieroglyphic writings of the first race. Of the superiority of the
first people who left their writings on the rocks and boulders found in
the ancient mounds, ruins and graves, there can be no doubt, for their
writings show order and a well defined design in symbols, which were
evidently intended to convey their history to others; and it is quite
probable that those who made the great mounds, houses and canals were
the authors of these writings. It may be truthfully asserted that the
cliff dwellers of the rock houses in the deep canons of the mountains
were of the same race as the mound builders of the valleys, for exactly
the same class of hieroglyphics found on boulders from the ancient ruins
of the valleys, are