Enchanted Rock is Central Texas's most intriguing and enigmatic natural landmark. Rising from the surrounding oak savanna amid a chain of rugged granite hills, the massive granite dome rises 325 feet from base to summit and covers an area of one square mile. Visitors approaching Enchanted Rock are offered a sudden and spectacular panorama of this remarkable attraction.

Enchanted Rock

I first encountered Enchanted Rock almost forty years ago. Gradually, I was captivated by its incredible beauty and inherent mystery. In the early 1970s I camped there frequently, often alone, well past the reach of civilization. I became intimately familiar with its creeks, its caves, and its granite outcrops, from Sandy Creek to Walnut Spring Creek and beyond. In the winter I cracked ice-covered springs for water, and later in the season noted which ones survived a summer drought. In the process I learned much about the land and myself as well, but the full meaning and history of the place remained elusive.

Eventually, I turned to a wide variety of books on Texas history to fill in the gaps of my knowledge. I soon realized there was more to the place than a series of facts and events presented in chronological order. What was known of Enchanted rock prior to the seventeenth century is lost to history. To reach into its prehistory I delved into hundreds of books on Native Americans, anthropology, archaeology, and mythology. Gradually, like photographic paper in a developing tray, a remarkably detailed image began to emerge.

When humans find a place new to them, they cast a longing gaze across the landscape and see, as in a still pond, not the land itself but a reflection of their innermost desires. Due to its unusual shape, it was seen by the Native Americans as a place set apart by the Creator as a religious shrine. Later, with the arrival of the Spanish and subsequently the Texans, its mineral-rich substance, particularly the deposits of gold and silver, became its primary attrac ...

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