Petroglyph National Monument
Albuquerque, New Mexico, United States
A 17-mile basalt escarpment at the edge of Albuquerque holding more than 15,000 carved images that Pueblo communities regard as their ancestors' speech, not art.
Along the West Mesa escarpment at Albuquerque's western edge, basalt boulders carry an estimated 15,000 to 24,000 carved images, made over centuries by ancestral Puebloan peoples and later Hispanic residents, in the shadow of a chain of volcanic cones. The National Park Service and the City of Albuquerque manage the monument together across about seventeen miles and several units: Boca Negra Canyon, Rinconada Canyon, Piedras Marcadas Canyon, and the Volcanoes Day Use Area.
The Pueblos of the region, Isleta and Sandia among them, regard the images not as art but as communication and living presence, and that framing governs the entry the way it governs the place. The monument's modern history includes the 1990s Paseo del Norte road extension fought through its midst, and development pressure continues on the city-owned lands; the escarpment survives as a prayer landscape under an urban skyline.
Visiting
Petroglyph National Monument is free, day use: visitor center and Boca Negra Canyon open 8:30am to 4:30pm, the other trailheads sunrise to sunset; the petroglyphs are along the unit trails, not at the visitor center.
Photo: [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Petroglyph_National_Monument_New_Mexico.jpg), CC BY-SA 4.0, Mmyers240.
Associated traditions & practices
Visitor stories