Helan Mountain rock art 贺兰山岩画

About Helan Mountain rock art

Human faces, animals and scenes associated with pastoral life appear on the rock surfaces. Differences between pecked and ground lines are worth looking for. The carvings do not all belong to one securely dated period, so precise age claims should be treated with care.

Rock carvings in the Helan Mountains stretch from Shizuishan in the north to Zhongwei in the south and include some Western Xia script alongside images of human faces and pastoral life. They were first recorded by Li Daoyuan, a Northern Wei geographer, in his fifth-century Commentary on the Water Classic, and rediscovered in modern times by Li Xiangshi (李祥石) in 1969.

The rock art was listed as a Major Historical and Cultural Site Protected at the National Level (全国重点文物保护单位) in 1996, though the listing recorded only the carvings in Helan County, Yinchuan. In 1997 it was placed on the Unofficial List of World Cultural Heritage by UNESCO's International Petroglyph Committee (联合国教科文组织国际岩画委员会). Yinchuan applied for World Heritage status in April 2004, and in 2008 the Helankou scenic area was approved as a national 4A tourist attraction (国家AAAA级旅游景区).

A rock art management office was established in Yinchuan in 2002 to protect carvings at twelve mountain passes and develop the Helankou and Baisikou scenic areas. A city regulation protecting the rock art took effect in September 2003, after which vandalism gradually stopped. From 2008 the office worked with a research institute at the Nanjing Museum (南京博物院文物保护研究所) on a rescue protection plan, approved by heritage authorities in January 2014.

What to look for

• Human-face motifs are especially associated with Helankou.
• Animal figures and differing carving techniques reward close observation.

Location & getting there

Getting to Helan Mountain rock art

Use the Helan Mountain Rock Art scenic-area visitor entrance at Helankou, west of Yinchuan. This is a specific managed site; other rock-art locations across the mountain range are not covered by the same visit.