Writing-on-Stone Provincial Park
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How it came to be
Writing-on-Stone lies in the Milk River valley in southern Alberta, at the northern edge of the Great Plains. On sandstone cliffs and hoodoos carved by erosion, people of the Blackfoot Confederacy engraved and painted thousands of images. Its Blackfoot name, Áísínai'pi, means it is pictured, or written.
Dated archaeological remains range from about 4,500 to 3,500 years ago, with more from the period of contact with Europeans. Most of the rock art was made between about 1,000 years ago and the mid-19th century, and the oldest may go back about 3,000 years. The Blackfoot regard the landscape as sacred and still hold ceremonies there.
A North-West Mounted Police outpost stood in the valley until it closed in 1918, after which it was burned by unknown persons. The area became a provincial park in 1957, an archaeological preserve in 1977 and a National Historic Site in 2005, and it was inscribed as a World Heritage site in 2019.
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