With one of the highest concentrations of rock art in the world, Tsodilo has been called the 'Louvre of the Desert'. Over 4,500 paintings are preserved in an area of only 10 sq. km of the Kalahari Desert. The archaeological record of the area gives a chronological account of human activities and ... Read more »

Many of the numerous rock shelters in the Serra da Capivara National Park are decorated with cave paintings, some more than 25,000 years old. They are an outstanding testimony to one of the oldest human communities of South America. Copyright © 1992 - 2006 UNESCO/World Heritage Centre. All right... Read more »

Riversleigh and Naracoorte, situated in the north and south respectively of eastern Australia, are among the world's 10 greatest fossil sites. They are a superb illustration of the key stages of evolution of Australia's unique fauna. Copyright © 1992 - 2006 UNESCO/World Heritage Centre. All righ... Read more »

The fossil remains of a series of lakes and sand formations that date from the Pleistocene can be found in this region, together with archaeological evidence of human occupation dating from 45–60,000 years ago. It is a unique landmark in the study of human evolution on the Australian conti... Read more »

These two contiguous parks, extending over 275,300 ha in the desert region on the western border of the Sierra Pampeanas of central Argentina, contain the most complete continental fossil record known from the Triassic Period (245-208 million years ago). Six geological formations in the parks con... Read more »

This exceptional concentration of rock carvings from the Upper Palaeolithic (22,000–10,000 B.C.) is the most outstanding example of early human artistic activity in this form anywhere in the world. Copyright © 1992 - 2006 UNESCO/World Heritage Centre. All rights reserved. Read more »

Kondoa Rock Art Sites, on the eastern slopes of the Masai escarpment bordering the Great Rift Valley are natural rock shelters, overhanging slabs of sedimentary rocks fragmented by rift faults, whose vertical planes have been used for rock paintings over at least two millennia. The spectacular co... Read more »

This group of petroglyphs in the Alta Fjord, near the Arctic Circle, bears the traces of a settlement dating from c. 4200 to 500 B.C. The thousands of paintings and engravings add to our understanding of the environment and human activities on the fringes of the Far North in prehistoric times. Co... Read more »

Seven megalithic temples are found on the islands of Malta and Gozo, each the result of an individual development. The two temples of Ggantija on the island of Gozo are notable for their gigantic Bronze Age structures. On the island of Malta, the temples of Hagar Qin, Mnajdra and Tarxien are uniq... Read more »

Situated within a cluster of forested granite hills and covering an area of 126.4 km2, high up the plateau of central Malawi, the area features the richest concentration of rock art in Central Africa on 127 sites. They reflect the comparatively scarce tradition of farmer rock art, as well as pain... Read more »