The Haunting of Paint Rock
If you’ve ever visited the Tarheel state, you’ll know that the area is packed with Native American folklore. You can find Paint Rock, a 5,000-year-old pictograph, located 6 miles from Hot Springs in Madison County, North Carolina, close to the Tennessee border. A sacred spot for the Cherokee tribe, the place has religious and paranormal significance. It’s a miraculous place that has survived thousands of years of storms, weather, and smoke from sooty campfires. For millennia, Paint Rock has acted as a landmark both for natives and English settlers in the region. It’s also a spookily beautiful landmark that’s just begging visitors to check it out.
The History of Paint Rock
Due to the hot springs that bubble out of the ground a few miles away, indigenous peoples in the Archaic Period considered this site a sacred place. As they traveled through the area, native people left their ageless mark on the outcropping cliffs in the gorge near the warm, healing waters.
Today, experts consider the paintings etched onto the 107-foot-high cliffs as some of the best pictographs in the United States. Painted in deep, indelible red, ochre, and cerulean blue paint made from local pigments, the earthy, rectilinear shades and shapes reflect the colors of land and sky. It’s clear that campfire smoke and weather have erased many magical paintings since the end of the 18th century. John Strother, who surveyed the North Carolina and Tennessee boundary line in 1790, saw images depicting animals, birds, and fish drawn in red paint about 20 or 30 feet above the ground. In 1796, a botanist named Andre Michaux also came across a “red-painted rock” near Warm Springs. By 1799, smoke from travelers’ campfires already started to cover some paintings. In fact, 6 guards stationed near the French Broad River guarded Paint Rock and the gorge it created as a major passage through the mountains bordering Cherokee territory. By 1859, it became a popular tourist stop. One stagecoach line even advertised that its stagecoaches crossed a mountain ridge in “full view of the Painted Rocks”.
The Haunting of Paint Rock
Since time immemorial, both native and early American regional lore gave Paint Rock special significance. It’s said that no one has deciphered the meaning of the mysterious pictographs decorating the cliffs. It’s a religious site with alleged connections to the supernatural. Since the nineteenth century, visitors and local people have seen the upright, unmistakable outline of a Cherokee man who passes through the woods close to the hot springs. Some reported seeing a Cherokee woman who haunts the area.
Others have heard her voice singing in the forest. If you approach the painted cliff, you might feel mysterious, ancient energy vibrating from the rock face. It’s still revered as a place for prayers and meditation. Some people believe that the area possesses a healing power. Maybe there’s a reason why Native Americans from the Archaic Period considered this place sacred.
Address: Hot Springs, North Carolina, 28743
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