A Postcard of Tamgaly Petroglyphs
'Tamgaly' is located 170 km northwest of Almaty, Kazakhstan's largest city, and is known for its ancient petroglyphs.
In 1957, a group of archaeologists discovered more than 5,000 different petroglyphs on the site which was registered in UNESCO World Heritage List in 2004.
The word 'tamgaly' has been derived from the Mongolian word 'tamga' meaning 'seal and sign'.
"Many of these engravings and petroglyphs contain motifs of animals and humans with sun-like heads", Rinat Sharipov, a scholar of the petroglyphs, says. "Many of these petroglyphs date back to the Bronze Age era, i.e. 14th to 12th centuries BC."
Sacred images, along with altars, temples and cemeteries of various belief systems portrays way of life in the Central Asia steppes in antiquity.