My Son and I spent last week hunting a ranch in Blanco County. My Son is a trainer at Camp Gladiator and covers a lot of land with his bow. He found this “slab” lying on top of a big granite outcropping that he climbed for a view of the area. Some of it is straight forward (but a mystery) but the engraving at the bottom has us baffled. It is carved into the rock inverted to the rest of it. It includes the date 1886 so that confirms the orientation. We brushed it with sand to make it easier to read. We did not move it in any way and I’ve notified the landowner of it. Please throw out you ideas as to what it is and especially what that bottom line says. Please save your jokes and incredible wit for another post. Thanks!

I’m no help but man that’s cool ! Would love to hear what the landowner knew about it.

Looks like a headstone.

Very interesting and just plain cool find.

Awesome find.
did right think.
Agree with Stompy, headstone.


kinda looks like he scratched the outline first.
What the M.W.O.B. stands for could be something with Date Of Birth.
M - month W - could have been (miss print) Y for year.
Then decided start over. Point @ top, flat base for bottom.



As deerslayer64d posted, would love ta hear more about it.
Cool find.
Thanks for sharing part of history.

edit, also looks like a small L sketched in after the B.

J M Thompson passed away May 30 1886.

The landowner was really excited about it. I took around 20 pictures of it for him. I showed the pics to my fellow hunters but won’t tell them where it is until the landowner has a chance to see it. I don’t want anybody messing with it. It’s high enough on the rock that dropping it would probably break it. It’s not obvious from a distance but you can see it sitting on top when you get close. I imagine no one else has gotten close enough to see it because it’s surrounded by a LOT of turkey cactus and prickly pear cactus. A LOT meaning around 60-70 yards of it and from that distance, you can’t see it. By looking at the pics, the landowner thinks the rock is talc.

It's a head stone, and looking at it I think Walkabout may very well be right ! Really great find, and God Bless the person who died and who took the time to do the marker

Very interesting.

Perhaps the bottom portion is the person who carved it initials and date. Something like M. W. O Brian might have been what the initials stand for but pure guessing with a dash then the date of 1886.

Maybe the MWOB stands for messed with ornery bear ?

Seriously though that is a very cool find. I think it is interesting it was sitting on top of that granite. No one is buried where you found it. Why is it sitting up there and not by a grave in the dirt?

Is the headstone on the top in the picture? Pretty interesting find

I'd tell the landowner to do his homework before he inquires with any archeologist or any similar group. It's my understanding that finds like this can be forced into protected areas and it could become a significant headache for the landowner.

Very neat find. The rock doesn't appear to match the surrounding rock, so I guess a mule hauled it up there. Could be the deceased perished there, or in the vicinity. God bless the departed and the person who hauled and carved it...even if he couldn't spell "shepherd"...or "sheep".

Of course, that even adds more to the character of the whole site.

Is it about a mile west of Blanco?

Who knows. It's possible the deceased is buried at the base of the rock....but the reason for that would be anyone's guess.

The large rock represents a large and identifiable 'marker' and the headstone being placed upon it....simply a tribute and historical record of death.

Maybe the rock was a favorite site of the deceased earlier in life or perhaps was the site of his/her death, no telling.

But surely the site chosen is meant to preserve 'remembrance'. There is clear significance there. The headstone was not placed there willy-nilly.

Married Wife 08 ?

A good chance he is buried at the base of the large rock and the tombstone was set in the rock and fell over.

Mound West of Burial

Mound West of Blanco

Looks like that part was meant to be in the ground. Could have been instructions for placing the tombstone?

Who knows?

Pretty cool though.

Having become almost obsessed with the inverted line…my idea is Mortal Wound On 8 1886. Thanks to all for the comments.

Your understanding isn't quite right, at least not by antiquities laws. Archaeologists are not the burials or antiquities police. There are no state or federal laws saying that you must protect private property such as this, though there may be other laws related to not disturbing a grave or corpse, but that would be outside of antiquities laws. Plus, 'not disturbing' isn't the same thing as actively protecting. So for example, if a river changes course and is threatening the location where the carved stone was found, the landowner would not be on the hook for protecting the site (if it is a site) from damage, mitigation of the site, or a full scale excavation and data recovery. He may not be able to put in a housing development without having the grave (if it is there) moved elsewhere, but again, that would fall under burial laws more so than antiquities laws.

If this was on state or federal land, other laws may come into play because of the age of the artifact, but this isn't on state or federal land, so would not apply.

However, what is present is only a carved rock, not insitu. It is not known where the grave is. So this is a singular artifact which does not constitute being an archaeological site, even.

The THC has a page on suggestions to how you can help protect historic cemeteries, but note that nothing says such protections are legal requirements.
https://www.thc.texas.gov/preserve/...can-i-do/how-protect-historic-cemeteries

Super cool find I'm impressed!

My thought is that it was simply a type of memorial marker by the cattle drover, J.M. Thompson, and that he was on the final cattle drive on the Chisolm Trail,
The trail ran thru various parts of that county on the way north. The Chisolm Trail was winding down at about that time.

Jaspeer M. Thompson, aka J.M. Thompson, was a Confederate soldier out of Bexar County, and was a cowboy after the War.

It would have to be determined if the scribe is an 08 (numerical) or OB (alphabetical).

'OB' was sometimes used as an abbreviation. But who knows. There are periods after each character so likely neither.