Component-I (A) – Personal details: 1 Component-I (B) – Description of module: Subject Name Indian Culture Paper Name Outlines of Indian History Module Name/Title Pre-historic Cultures in India Module Id I C/ OIH/ 04 Knowledge in origin and evolution of Pre-historic Pre-requisites cultures To know the pre-historic cultures in India and its Objectives salient features Keywords Pre- historic/ Paleolithic / Neolihtic / Megalithic E-text (Quadrant-I) 1. Introduction The whole of Indian subcontinent is rich in archaeological sites and remains. Pre-historic sites are both numerous and obvious in much of the Indian subcontinent. It is not therefore, surprising that the stone tools of the Palaeolithic period were found and recognized in India only shortly after they had received official recognition in Europe. The rediscovery of ancient India was in origin almost entirely European, indeed to a large extent British. Robert Bruce Foote, a British Geologist, has rightly been called as the “Father of Indian Pre-history”. During the sixties, seventies and eighties of 19thcentury, he worked unceasingly in the field, and wherever his geological duties took him, he discovered archaeological treasure in the shape of Pre-historic remains. It is true to say that almost every important Pre-historic site in peninsular India vowed its discovery to him. In 1863, Foote discovered the first Indian Paleolithic artifact from a locality at Pallavaram, near Madras (now Chennai). During 1850s Colonel Meadows Taylor carried out number of outstanding excavations of Megalithic graves in Hyderabad State. Prior to it, M.C. Burkitt of Cambridge University, England published an account of the collection of a Magistrate, L.A. Cammaide, from the Krishna basin, and Professors H. De Terra and T.T. Patterson led the Yale-Cambridge Expedition to study the glacial sequence of Kashmir and the Punjab and to relate their findings to the Pre-historic industries of the Punjab, Narmada and Madras. Another archaeologist who contributed greatly to our knowledge of Indian Pre-history was Sir Aurel Stein, whose continuing expeditions led him to Baluchistan and eastern Iran, the Punjab, and North West Frontier Province, no less than to more remote regions of Central Asia. 2. History and Prehistory The period for which written records are available and used as a primary source in understanding the past is historic period, and all periods proceeding this fall under prehistory. The settled life of human past, which led to development of civilizations, and urban centres for which written records are available, yet undeciphered falls under a separate division, at least in India, which is known as proto-history. The Harappan civilization 2 falls under this category along with the cultures immediately preceding (chalcolithic) and succeeding (Iron Age) it. Indian prehistory, following several models and based on the evidence of sites of different cultural ages, has been divided into (i) Palaeolithic, (ii) Mesolithic / Microlithic, (iii) Neolithic and (iv) Megalithic periods. The Palaeolithic period is further divided into (i) Lower, (ii) Middle and (iii) Upper palaeolithic periods or cultures, based on stone tool making technologies, styles and stratigraphic sequence. 3. The Palaeolithic Age The word ‘paleo’ means old and ‘lith’ is stone and therefore it is also called Old Stone Age. It is the earliest period in India where the first human habitation was noticed. The predominant tool prepared and used during this age is of stone, probably supplemented by wooden, bone antler tools. The communities were living in open air or cave settlements. The evidence for cave settlements comes from sites like Bhimbetka in Madhya Pradesh. The Palaeolithic is further sub-divided into lower, middle and upper palaeolithic periods and the chronology varies from region to region. The findings of early Miocene hominoids like Sivapithecus (14 to 7 Ma) and Ramapithecus (13 to 9 Ma) from the Siwalik deposits of India and Pakistan are a good evidence of primate evolution in Indian sub-continent. Even though the Narmada valley and other river valleys did reveal fossils of faunal species, human fossils are always scanty. In the Narmada valley, faunal remains of species like Bos namadicus, Sus namadicus, Hexaprotodon namadicus, Elephas hysudricus, Equus namadicus and Stegodon-insignis-ganesa belonging to Middle Pleistocene are found associated with Acheulian artefacts. The only hominid fossil remain is that of an archaic Homo sapiens from Hathnora, near Hoshangabad in the Narmada valley. The fossil was found in association with stone tools of late Acheulian type from eroded gravels. A general date of 125,000 is agreed among the scholars for the date of this hominid remains. Petraglia observes that the geographical and environmental conditions determined the palaeolithic occupation in the Indian subcontinent and identifies distinct ‘regions and eco- zones’ consisting broadly of the (i) greater and lesser Himalayan region, (ii) adjoining Siwaliks, (iii) Indo-Gangetic plains and (iv) peninsular India. 3.1 Lower Palaeolithic The Lower Palaeolithic in India, about which we have as yet very little cultural information beyond that to be gained from the stone tools themselves, which include hand-axe industries which generally parallel to those of Western Asia, Europe and Africa, but with certain differences and exceptions. The principal tools are the hand-axe and the cleaver, core tools of discoidal and elliptical outline made in a similar manner to the hand-axes, chopping tools of various types and flakes. The studies conducted by various scholars indicate that the earliest hominin occupation in Indian sub-continent belongs to Acheulian. The dates for earliest hominin occupation in the form of stone tool assemblages are also available from several sites like Riwat in Pakistan (1.9 ma) while well dated Acheulian sequences in Pakistan date between 800 and 700 ka. The overall time bracket for Acheulian assemblages in India is between 400 and 300 ka even though an ESR date of 1.2 Ma is reported from Isampur. The various eco-zones in the Himalayan, Siwaliks and peninsular region have yielded a number of Acheulian bearing sites in different ecological and topographical settings, while it has been interpreted that the Indo- Gangetic plains could have served as a barrier for large-scale human dispersals between the Himalayan and peninsular India, due to the paucity of raw materials. 3 The evidence for lower palaeolithic presence from the Indian subcontinent is found from sites like Riwat (in Pakistan) on the Soan River, datable to around 1.9 Ma. Another locality yielding early presence is from Pabbi Hills in Upper Siwalik region (in Pakistan), consisting of stone artefacts (simple cores and flakes) on erosional surfaces of fossiliferous deposits. Three such deposits have been dated to ages ranging between 1.4-1.2 Ma; 0.9-1.2 Ma and 1.7-2.2 Ma. While the earlier studies undertaken by De Terra and Paterson tried to identify differences in Soan (unifacial tools on cores and rarer bifacial pieces)and Acheulian (standardized bifaces consisting of handaxes, cleavers and picks on cores and flakes) industries, Petraglia identifies that there is no distinct Soan-Acheulian dichotomy even though there is a generally recognized technological and typological difference between them. Lower Palaeolithic remains are also found from several other localities in the sub-continent like valleys of the Beas River, another tributary of the Indus,Attirampakkam, Pallavaram near Chennai, Kurnool, Cuddapah, Nellore, Prakasam, Guntur, Anantapuram, Nalgonda, Warangal, Karimnagar, Adilabad districts in Andhra Pradesh in the river valleys of Penna, Gundlakamma, Krishna, Godavari and their tributaries and in the rock-shelters at Billasurgam (Kurnool), Hunsgi and Baichbal, Tungabhadra, Bhima, Malaprabha, river valleys and at other places. The excavations in a cave at Gudiyam, near Attirampakkam have shown that the early man has not regularly and continuously inhabited the cave. The site of Isampur revealed a remarkably preserved tool manufacturing industry and occupation activities. A considerable number of caves and rock shelters have been examined and excavated by several archaeologists. R.V. Joshi excavated Adamgarh Hills in Narmada valley and found lower palaeolithic and Mesolithic assemblages. The stone tools of lower palaeolithic comprised of hand-axes, chopping tools, ovates, and a few cleavers. A continuous human occupation starting from lower palaeolithic is indicated from the remains at Bhimbetka caves in Madhya Pradesh. The majority of the tools found in all parts of the sub-continent are made of quartzite. Sometimes pebbles were used, particularly for making the earlier and cruder hand-axes, and for making chopping tools at all periods. The other source of quartzite was outcrops of rock and boulders. Factory sites of both pebbles and boulders of various sizes had clearly provided the raw material and can be seen in various parts of India. The stone hand-axes were hafted to wooden handles for easy handling of the same for cutting the flesh of the animals and for cutting the roots of the trees. 3.2 Middle Palaeolithic The Middle Palaeolithic tool industry is characterized by flake core types, which is distinct from the previous bifacial industry of Acheulian. Further, it is also identified based on stratigraphy, changes in tool technologies and styles. The prepared core technique or the Levallois technique, which appears during the Middle Palaeolithic