{"id":"MCCARTHY1983-001","label":"Cromer Valley bent-line motif","people_or_site":"Cromer Valley Shark engraving site, Red Hill Reserve; McCarthy's MANLY Group 38","country_current":"Australia","historic_region":"Cromer Valley / Wheeler Creek, Northern Beaches, Sydney, New South Wales","macroregion":"Australia / New South Wales","local_name":"","source_term":"bullroarer on a bent line","source_language":"English","object_description":"A pecked line figure about two feet long, a bent line curving into an open-ended oval at one end, on the same sandstone platform as the site's shark/fish and circular mundoe figures; preserved in W. D. Campbell's 1899 site plan and now reported as covered by vegetation.","function_summary":"Not recorded.","attestation_type":"rock_art_depiction","source_key":"mccarthy1983_sydney_hawkesbury_manly_group38","source_type":"archaeological_catalog","source_url":"https://hikingtheworld.blog/engravings/cromer-valley-shark/","page_or_plate":"McCarthy 1983, MANLY Group 38; Campbell 1899, MANLY Plate XVI, fig. 4","map_confidence":"low","plot_status":"candidate_only","coordinate_basis":"Red Hill Reserve bushland anchor between Beacon Hill and Cromer, on the Wheeler Creek side; no engraving-site coordinate is published and none is sought for a rock-art place.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"On a sandstone platform in the bush above Wheeler Creek, beside a shark and a scatter of mundoe footprints, someone pecked a bent line two feet long that curls into an open oval at one end. W. D. Campbell drew the whole panel in 1899 and mentioned only a small circle in his text; the scrub has since closed over the rock, so his plan is effectively the only view of the figure anyone now has. When Frederick McCarthy catalogued the Sydney-Hawkesbury engravings in 1983 he set down two readings side by side: a bullroarer on its cord, or a penis and testicles. Nothing in the record carries an Aboriginal explanation of the motif. Its exact age is unknown; the Sydney engraving tradition is conventionally placed within roughly the last five thousand years.","pull_quote":"representing a bullroarer on a bent line curved into an open ended oval at the other end, or it represents a penis and testicles, 2 ft long","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"McCarthy 1983, MANLY Group 38, as quoted in the Cromer Valley Shark site record","term_gloss":"No local term; 'bullroarer on a bent line' is McCarthy's catalogue phrase for the motif.","cls":"unknown","class_label":"Function not recorded","color":"#6B7884","is_candidate":true,"flags":[],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"f_archaeology":true,"archaeology_kind":"rock_art","date_display":"c. 3000 BC–AD 1800","date_qualification":"Conventional Sydney Simple Figurative engraving horizon; exact motif undated and recorded by 1899.","date_basis":"broad_context","date_confidence":"low","date_citation":"mccarthy1983_sydney_hawkesbury_manly_group38, Campbell 1899 MANLY pl. XVI fig. 4; McCarthy 1983 MANLY Group 38; Stanbury and Clegg 2000","sources":[{"citation":"Cromer Valley Shark site record, Hiking the World; quoting F. D. McCarthy (1983), MANLY Group 38","url":"https://hikingtheworld.blog/engravings/cromer-valley-shark/","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20261013032719/https://hikingtheworld.blog/engravings/cromer-valley-shark/"},{"citation":"F. D. McCarthy, Catalogue of Rock Engravings in the Sydney-Hawkesbury District, N.S.W. (1983), MANLY Group 38, via the Cromer Valley Shark site record"},{"citation":"W. D. Campbell, Aboriginal Carvings of Port Jackson and Broken Bay (1899), MANLY pl. XVI, fig. 4"}],"source_citations":"Cromer Valley Shark site record, Hiking the World; quoting F. D. McCarthy (1983), MANLY Group 38; F. D. McCarthy, Catalogue of Rock Engravings in the Sydney-Hawkesbury District, N.S.W. (1983), MANLY Group 38, via the Cromer Valley Shark site record; W. D. Campbell, Aboriginal Carvings of Port Jackson and Broken Bay (1899), MANLY pl. XVI, fig. 4","source_display":"Cromer Valley Shark site record, Hiking the World; quoting F. D. McCarthy (1983), MANLY Group 38; F. D. McCarthy, Catalogue of Rock Engravings in the Sydney-Hawkesbury District, N.S.W. (1983), MANLY Group 38, via the Cromer Valley Shark site record; W. D. Campbell, Aboriginal Carvings of Port Jackson and Broken Bay (1899), MANLY pl. XVI, fig. 4","date_citation_display":"Campbell 1899 MANLY pl. XVI fig. 4; McCarthy 1983 MANLY Group 38; Stanbury and Clegg 2000","object_display":"A pecked line figure about two feet long, a bent line curving into an open-ended oval at one end, on the same sandstone platform as the site's shark/fish and circular mundoe figures; preserved in W. D. Campbell's 1899 site plan and now reported as covered by vegetation.","function_display":"Not recorded.","confidence_display":"low","attestation_label":"rock art depiction","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"cromer valley","display_name":"Cromer Valley bent-line motif","image":{"full":"assets/objects/hunt_rounds123_2026_10_30/mccarthy1983-001_cromer-plate.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/hunt_rounds123_2026_10_30/thumbs/mccarthy1983-001_cromer-plate.jpg","alt":"Line drawing of scattered engravings in a frame: a shark, circles and a bent line figure.","credit":"W. D. Campbell (1899), plan of the Cromer Valley engravings","source_page":"https://hikingtheworld.blog/engravings/cromer-valley-shark/","rehosted":true,"representative":false,"caption":"Campbell’s 1899 plan of the Cromer Valley engravings."},"slug":"mccarthy1983-001-cromer-valley-shark-engraving-site-red-hill-reserve-mccarthy-s-manly-grou"}