Oh, I fulluy agree, if I understamd well your line of thought. I don't think prehistoric art was fully understood by all, at least in its "communication dimension". Your Bruegel's example is very good, and could apply to Pêche Merle, etc.; what do teh dots stand for, for instance? But I also think there is a shift in the relation to what we came to name as "nature". I think the expansion of teh roads system (with writting in some cases, but not always with it - eg. Maayas), modified the relation between the dwelling space and the outer space (agriculture strated to do it, actually, but roads took it everywhere). Instead of "humans within a web of multi-entities relation", we entered a domestic vs wild space, the later being condemns to be tamed, sooner of later, and then become extinct. The notion of extinction of the wilderness would make little sense for prehistoric and early protohistoric societies.

I believe your explanation would have a relevance in the process, George. However, if we look at this in global terms, I think that the initial question relates to the puzziling cross-cultural convergence until and after the Iron age: before, you have an extensive (even if not continuous) use of rock art; after, you have a common dramatic decrease of rock art (graffiti being different in many respects, and particularly one I would like to stress: rock art is "enbedded in the wider environment" while graffiti are "embedded in the domus/urban environment"). I think that the big change in between the two is written communication (e.g., you have little or no rock art, but you have roman milestones, etc.). In a sense, writting, comined with roads, "urbanises" the landscape for teh first time, rendering it less relevant to claim parts of the wilderness to the anthropic control: the logic changes, no longer in order to establish "reference points" in the landscape, but taming all of it.