Long before Panama became famous for the Panama Canal, its Caribbean beaches, tropical rainforests and extraordinary wildlife, people were already carving messages into its rocks. Scattered across the country are ancient petroglyphs, images engraved into stone by people who lived here centuries, and in some cases potentially much longer, before European arrival. These markings offer a fascinating glimpse into the imagination, beliefs and cultural traditions of the people who inhabited the narrow land bridge connecting North and South America.
Some petroglyphs resemble suns, spirals, waves, faces, animals or abstract geometric patterns. Others are so unusual that even experienced researchers cannot confidently explain what they represent. They are part of a much wider human tradition of carving symbols into stone, found across Central America, South America and nearly every inhabited continent.
What makes Panama especially interesting is its geographical position. It sits between two great continental regions, in a landscape of rivers, mountains, forests and coastlines that encouraged human movement and contact over thousands of years. Its ancient rock art therefore belongs to a story much bigger than Panama itself.
What exactly are petroglyphs?
Petroglyphs are images or symbols created by removing part of a rock's surface. Ancient artists used stone tools to chip, peck, scrape or engrave lines into exposed rock, leaving designs that could survive long after the people who made them had disappeared.
They are different from pictographs, which are images painted onto rock using pigments such as charcoal, minerals or other natural materials. Because engraved images are physically cut into stone, petroglyphs can sometimes survive for hundreds or thousands of years, although tropical rainfall, erosion, vegetation and other natural processes can gradually wear them away.
Creating one was not necessarily a quick task. Depending on the hardness of the rock and the complexity of the design, an artist might have needed considerable time and patience to produce a clearly defined image. The decision to mark a particular rock may also have mattered as much as the design itself. A prominent boulder beside a river, a rock outcrop near a mountain pass or a stone in a location associated with traditional ceremonies could have carried significance beyond its physical appearance.
The difficulty is that petroglyphs rarely explain themselves. Without written descriptions from their creators, researchers must investigate their shapes, locations, archaeological surroundings and similarities to other cultural objects. Even then, an interpretation may remain uncertain.
Where can petroglyphs be found in Panama?
Panama's rock art is not a single, uniform tradition. Archaeologists have documented engravings in different parts of the country, including the Coclé region, where researchers have systematically recorded the designs in the Río Coclé del Sur basin.
Studies of this rock art have examined the distribution, subject matter and techniques of the engravings. Researchers have also explored possible relationships between the designs and decorative imagery found on Gran Coclé's famous pre-Columbian pottery. These comparisons can help investigate whether artistic traditions changed over time or shared visual conventions.
The wider archaeological picture is particularly intriguing because ancient Panama supported communities with distinctive regional traditions. People produced elaborate ceramics, worked gold, exchanged valuable objects and maintained connections with neighboring areas. Panama was not an isolated corner of the ancient world. It was part of a landscape through which people, materials and ideas moved.
However, it is important not to assume that every engraved stone belongs to the same period or culture. Petroglyphs can be difficult to date directly, and a rock carving found near an archaeological settlement is not automatically contemporary with that settlement.
That uncertainty is part of what makes the subject so fascinating. Two carvings that look similar may have been made centuries apart, while two carvings made around the same time may look completely different.
The symbols: suns, spirals, waves and mysterious faces
One of the most interesting features of Panama's petroglyphs is the variety of shapes used to decorate stone.
Geometric patterns, curved lines, circles, spirals and stylized figures appear in rock art traditions throughout the Americas. Some designs seem to represent recognizable objects, while others are difficult to classify. A circular pattern might resemble a sun, an eye or a water ripple. A winding line might suggest a river, a snake or a path. These are possible visual interpretations, not proven explanations of what the original artists intended.
The sun and the natural world
Circular motifs with radiating lines are among the most immediately recognizable designs in rock art around the world. Modern observers often interpret them as suns, and that interpretation can be visually persuasive. Yet without supporting evidence, it is difficult to know whether a particular carving represents the sun, another celestial object or a more abstract idea.
For ancient communities living close to the natural world, the movement of the sun, seasonal changes, rainfall and the rhythms of rivers would have been important aspects of everyday life. It is reasonable to investigate whether some symbols related to these observations, but we should avoid assigning a specific meaning to an image simply because it looks familiar to us.
Spirals and flowing lines
Spirals are particularly intriguing because they occur in archaeological art across many different regions and periods. They can be produced relatively easily with simple carving tools, yet they offer endless variations in size, direction and complexity.
A spiral might have represented movement, growth, water, a journey or a concept that has no direct equivalent in modern language. It might also have been a conventional decorative motif whose meaning depended on the community using it.
In Panama, where rivers descend from the mountains through dense forest toward both the Caribbean and Pacific coasts, flowing lines can remind a modern observer of watercourses. That makes an appealing interpretation, but resemblance alone cannot establish what an ancient symbol meant.
Animals and human figures
Some ancient rock art traditions include recognizable human figures and animals, while others favor abstract designs. These images can be especially valuable when researchers can compare them with objects found in archaeological excavations, including pottery, ornaments and carved figurines.
Panama's pre-Columbian communities produced sophisticated artistic traditions, and studying their rock art alongside these other objects may reveal connections that would otherwise be missed.
The important point is that ancient people were not simply decorating stones at random. Their designs may have expressed identity, belief, memory, social relationships or ideas about the world around them. The challenge is working out which interpretation best fits the evidence.
How old are Panama's petroglyphs?
This is where things become particularly interesting, because the age of rock art is often much harder to establish than people imagine.
Unlike a ceramic vessel buried in a dated archaeological layer, a carving on an exposed boulder may have no obvious material that can be dated directly. The rock itself could be millions of years old, but that tells us nothing about when someone engraved it.
Researchers may estimate a carving's age by studying the archaeological deposits around it, examining weathering and mineral coatings where appropriate, or comparing its style with objects from well-dated contexts. Each approach has limitations.
A carving could also have been made long after the first people settled in the surrounding area. In some places, rock art traditions continued for generations or even centuries.
Consequently, it would be misleading to give all Panamanian petroglyphs a single age. Some may belong to relatively recent pre-Columbian communities, while the possibility of older examples must be assessed individually.
For perspective, archaeologists have found evidence of human occupation in Panama dating back at least 13,000 years, although the earliest settlement chronology remains a subject of research. That establishes how ancient human presence in the isthmus can be, but it does not prove that Panama's surviving petroglyphs are equally old.
The distinction matters. It is tempting to look at an enigmatic carving and imagine it was created by the earliest inhabitants of the Americas. The more interesting scientific question is what evidence can actually establish its age.
Panama's petroglyphs and their neighbours in Costa Rica
To understand Panama's rock art, one of the best places to look is immediately to the west, in Costa Rica.
The two countries share a long geographical and cultural relationship. Long before modern borders existed, communities in what is now southern Central America interacted through trade, migration and other forms of contact. Archaeologists have identified similarities between artistic traditions in the region, although the degree of connection varied by place and period.
A particularly interesting comparison is Guayabo de Turrialba, an archaeological site in Costa Rica known for its pre-Columbian settlement remains, stone features and carved imagery. Researchers have also examined the relationship between rock art traditions in Costa Rica and western Panama, including the archaeological centre of Barillas. These comparisons help establish regional context for interpreting the engravings.
The resemblance between some geometric designs in the two countries raises an intriguing question: did people share artistic conventions across the region?
It is certainly possible that some motifs circulated through contact between communities. Artists might have encountered unfamiliar designs during travel, trade or ceremonial gatherings. Equally, similar shapes can emerge independently because people everywhere have access to the same basic geometric forms.
A spiral does not automatically prove cultural exchange. Stronger evidence would include a distinctive combination of motifs, similarities in carving techniques, comparable archaeological dates and other indications of contact.
That is why Panama's position between Central and South America is so significant. It creates an opportunity to investigate connections without assuming that every resemblance reflects a common origin.
How Panama's petroglyphs compare with South American rock art
Travelling south from Panama brings us into a vast world of rock art traditions in Colombia, Venezuela, Brazil and beyond.
South America contains an extraordinary variety of ancient engravings and paintings. Some depict animals and human figures; others feature intricate geometric patterns, lines and abstract compositions. Their ages vary enormously, from relatively recent works to examples associated with very early human occupation.
One remarkable comparison comes from Lapa do Santo in Brazil. Researchers reported a carved humanlike figure associated with archaeological deposits that indicate an age of more than 10,500 years, potentially approaching 12,000 years. This is an exceptional example, not a date that can be applied to rock art elsewhere in the Americas.
The comparison demonstrates something important: people in the Americas were creating symbolic art thousands of years before the rise of the major civilizations that later became famous for monumental architecture, cities and complex political systems.
The people who made these early engravings were not necessarily part of the same cultural tradition as the later inhabitants of Panama. Nor is there evidence that a particular design from Brazil travelled north and became a Panamanian symbol. Rather, these discoveries reveal the deep antiquity and diversity of artistic expression across the continent.
Colombia is especially relevant to Panama because the two territories connect through the Darién region. People, animals and plants could move through this landscape, although its dense forests and difficult terrain also presented formidable challenges. Over many generations, contact between communities could have occurred through numerous routes and at different scales.
The archaeological question is not simply whether Panama's carvings resemble those farther south. It is whether their dates, distinctive design elements and archaeological contexts reveal a meaningful historical relationship.
What about the famous Maya and Aztec civilizations?
When people think about ancient symbols in the Americas, they often imagine the Maya of southern Mexico and Central America or the Aztec civilization of central Mexico.
These societies created remarkable works of art, including carved monuments, inscriptions, calendars and elaborate religious imagery. Some of their symbols can be interpreted with considerable confidence because they appear alongside writing, historical references or other well-understood cultural evidence.
Panama's petroglyphs are a different story.
Many are not accompanied by a decipherable written record. Their abstract designs can be difficult to interpret, and there is no basis for assuming that they shared the meanings of visually similar symbols in Maya or Aztec art.
The Maya developed sophisticated writing and calendrical systems, and some of their monuments record rulers, dates and historical events. A spiral or circular motif carved into a rock in Panama does not automatically belong to that same intellectual or religious system.
Chronology matters, too. Maya civilization developed over a long period, and different artistic traditions flourished at different times. The Aztec Empire emerged much later than the earliest known rock art in the Americas. Comparing a Panamanian engraving with an Aztec symbol without considering these differences could create a misleading historical connection.
Nevertheless, the broader comparison is worthwhile. Across the Americas, communities developed ways to represent ideas visually, preserve traditions and give significance to particular places. The results were diverse, reflecting different histories rather than a single universal system of symbols.
Were petroglyphs being created around the world at the same time?
The most fascinating comparison is with rock art beyond the Americas.
People in Australia, Africa, Europe and Asia also engraved and painted images on rock. Some traditions are thousands of years old, while others reach back into the distant prehistoric past.
The important distinction is that these traditions did not all begin at the same time, and similar images do not necessarily indicate a shared origin.
Consider three examples.
Australia: Aboriginal Australian rock art encompasses an enormous range of regional traditions, including paintings and engravings associated with landscapes, animals, ancestral narratives and cultural knowledge. Some traditions have deep antiquity, but the age of a particular image must be established independently.
North Africa: The Sahara contains remarkable prehistoric rock art, including images of wild animals, cattle and human activities. Some of these works preserve evidence of landscapes and ways of life very different from those found in the desert today.
Northern Europe: Scandinavian Bronze Age rock carvings include ships, human figures, animals, circles and other motifs. Many belong to a much later period than the earliest known American rock art, and their imagery reflects distinct regional traditions.
North America provides another useful comparison. Research on petroglyphs in California's Great Basin has identified examples that may date back more than 11,000 years, although the methods used to estimate the ages of rock engravings have their own uncertainties. Researchers have found that early rock art traditions across the Americas already displayed substantial regional differences.
This is a remarkable realization. By the time some of the earliest known American petroglyphs were being created, people were already developing different visual traditions in different parts of the hemisphere.
The story is not that everyone was carving the same symbols around the same time. It is that human beings in different environments were independently developing ways to express ideas through images.
Some chose animals. Others preferred geometric designs. Some created elaborate human figures, while others used abstract lines and patterns.
The shared human impulse is clear, even when the cultural meanings are not.
Why do similar symbols appear in places that are thousands of kilometres apart?
This question has fascinated archaeologists, historians and artists for generations.
Imagine finding a spiral carved into a rock in Panama, another in Australia and a third in Europe. The resemblance might seem too striking to be accidental. Could these people have shared a common tradition? Could a symbol have travelled across continents? Or did different communities simply arrive at a similar design independently?
There are several possible explanations.
First, simple geometric shapes are universal possibilities. A person with a sharp stone can make a line, a circle, a zigzag or a spiral without needing to learn the design from another culture.
Second, people often observe similar natural phenomena. The sun, stars, flowing water, plants and animals are part of human experience in many environments. These observations can inspire similar visual forms, even when the meanings differ.
Third, cultural exchange is real. Communities have traded, migrated and interacted throughout human history. Some artistic motifs genuinely spread between groups, and archaeological research can sometimes identify these relationships.
Finally, modern observers may see similarities that the original artists would not have recognized. Two shapes may look alike to us but have had entirely different meanings in their original contexts.
This last point is particularly important when discussing ancient symbols. A circular engraving is not proof of a common sun religion, and a spiral is not evidence of a worldwide ancient civilization.
The more rewarding approach is to investigate the evidence while leaving room for uncertainty.
What might Panama's petroglyphs have meant to the people who made them?
We cannot know the meaning of every carving, but there are several possibilities worth investigating.
Some may have had ceremonial or spiritual significance. Others could have marked particular places, communicated ideas or expressed relationships between communities and their surroundings. Some may have been associated with traditional stories, social identities or practices that are now difficult to reconstruct.
A rock carving's location can be as important as its appearance. Was it placed beside a river crossing? Was it part of a larger archaeological landscape? Were there settlements, burial sites or other carved stones nearby? Does its imagery resemble designs on objects from the same period?
These questions can help researchers move beyond speculation.
It is also worth remembering that ancient people did not necessarily distinguish between art, religion, history and everyday life in the same way modern societies do. A symbol might have served several purposes simultaneously, or its meaning might have changed over generations.
The absence of a written explanation does not mean that the people who created the carvings lacked complex ideas. It simply means that we must work harder to reconstruct those ideas from the evidence that remains.
Panama as a bridge between ancient worlds
Panama's importance in this story goes far beyond its petroglyphs.
Its position between North and South America made the isthmus a vital part of the movement of people and animals across the continents. Its mountains, rivers, forests and coastlines created a landscape where communities could develop distinctive regional traditions while also maintaining connections with their neighbours.
Over time, different societies in Panama developed their own artistic styles, technologies and cultural practices. Archaeological evidence shows that the region was home to sophisticated communities long before European arrival.
The country's rock art should be understood within that broader history. Some designs may reflect local traditions; others may eventually prove to have meaningful parallels with neighbouring regions. Each discovery can help refine our understanding of how people interacted across this part of the Americas.
What we should avoid is treating Panama as merely a corridor through which ideas passed between more famous civilizations. Its inhabitants were not simply copying their neighbours. They were creating their own traditions in a landscape with its own histories and meanings.
The mystery that makes petroglyphs so fascinating
Perhaps the greatest appeal of Panama's petroglyphs is that they occupy the space between what we know and what we can only imagine.
A carved circle may have taken an artist hours to produce. A pattern might have been taught to children, repeated by generations or created for a single occasion. A stone beside a river may have been a place of importance for reasons that have long since disappeared from living memory.
We may never discover the precise meaning of every symbol. Some engravings may remain permanently ambiguous. Yet each one is evidence that someone once chose to transform a natural surface into something meaningful.
And when we compare Panama's carvings with rock art from Costa Rica, Colombia, Brazil and much farther afield, we begin to see two stories at once: the distinct histories of individual communities and the remarkably widespread human desire to leave marks on the world.
Panama's petroglyphs are not necessarily the oldest, largest or most elaborate examples of ancient rock art. Their significance lies partly in their regional character and partly in their place within the wider history of human expression.
They remind us that long before modern borders divided the map, people were already observing their surroundings, developing artistic traditions and finding ways to communicate ideas that mattered to them.
Thousands of years later, those messages remain carved into stone, waiting for us to understand them.