PALAEOLITHIC AND MESOLITHIC CULTURES

DISCUSS THE SITE DISTRIBUTION AND SETTLEMENT/SUBSISTENCE PATTERNS OF PALAEOLITHIC AND MESOLITHIC CULTURES.

Prehistory refers to that phase of human history when earth was still taking shape and man was evolving biologically through various extinct species from the primates to its present form. It is a history of early mans struggle for survival in adverse environment and is marked by his steady progress from an animal hunting and wild food collecting wandering life to that of a food producing and cattle herding settled life.

Prehistory in India deals with Early Stone Age when man was a savage, a hunter, and a nomad. Based on the tool making traditions, the entire Stone Age culture has been divided into 3 main stages i.e. Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic. Robert Bruce Foote established the science of pre-history in India. The first evidence of Stone Age culture in India surfaced in Karnataka in 1842 when Dr. Primrose discovered polish stone knives and arrowheads at Lingsugur in Raichur district in Karnataka.

PALAEOLITHIC
The Palaeolithic (old stone) Age constitutes the longest phase of prehistory and covers the whole range of the Pleistocene epoch from about 2 mya 10,000 B.C. Palaeolithic Age has been divided into three phases - Lower Palaeolithic, the tools included handaxes, cleavers, choppers and chopping tools; Middle Palaeolithic, the tools largely had flakes; and Upper Palaeolithic, the tools mainly included burins and scrapers. This division is based on progressive improvement in tool types which gradually came to acquire better efficiency in their cutting edge and operating phase. The majority of tools found were made of quartzite. These tools, with some regional variations, exhibit remarkable similarity in their form, technique and raw material all over the Indian suB.C.ontinent.

PALAEOLITHIC SITES
Lower Palaeolithic stone tools have been found in the Sohan valley (Pakistan). A handaxe was discovered near Pahalgam in Kashmir on the River Lidder. These were known as the Sohanian industries and were dominated by pebble or core tools and characterized as chopper/chopping tools. In Rajasthan, lower, middle and upper Palaeolithic tools have been found around Ajmer and stray finds of lower Palaeolithic tools occur in the Luni valley. The Wagaon and Kadamali rivers in Mewar are rich in Middle Palaeolithic tools where a variety of scrapers, borers, and points have been discovered.

Rivers such as Sabarmati, Mahi, Tapi, Godavari, Bhima and Krishna have yielded a large number of Palaeolithic artefacts and tools. Palaeolithic tools like handaxes, chopper, cleavers, scrapers, and borers have been reported in Chirki (Maharashtra). Bhimbetka (near Bhopal) is a site in which tools representing the Acheulian tradition were replaced at a later stage by the Middle Palaeolithic Culture.

In the Peninsular region, Acheulian handaxes have been found in large numbers in Ghatprabha basin in Karnataka. Anagawadi and Bagalkot are two most important sites on Ghatprabha where both Early and Middle Palaeolithic tools have been found. Andhra Pradesh is rich in Palaeolithic material, and it is reported mainly from the districts of Kurnool (where bone tools are discovered in limestone caves), Chittoor, and Nalagonda. An Upper Palaeolithic blade and burin industry from a group of sites near Renigunta in Chittoor district, Andhra Pradesh was also found. The rivers Palar, Penniyar and Kaveri in Tamil Nadu are rich in Palaeolithic tools. Attirampakkam (Tamil Nadu) have yielded both Early and Middle Palaeolithic artefacts. Middle Palaeolithic artefacts are found at several places on the river Narmada, and at several sites, south of the Tungabhadra River.

In Bihar, a lower Palaeolithic living and working floor was excavated at Paisra in the Kharagpur forests where the area was rich in finished and unfinished artefacts, broken pieces of stone and anvils. The Buharbalang Valley in Orissa has many Lower and Middle Palaeolithic tools. Some Palaeolithic tools have been found in the deltaic region of Orissa formed by the Baitarani, Brahmani and Mahanadi rivers. In Singhbum, many Palaeolithic sites have been reported and the main artefacts are handaxes and choppers. The river valleys and foothills of the Chotanagpur plateau in Jharkhand and the adjoining areas of W. Bengal have yielded lower Palaeolithic tools.

The presence of Upper Palaeolithic artefacts has been reported in the Thar regions, at Sanghao caves in the North West Frontiers Province and in the Potwar plateau of the northern Punjab, from parts of South India, central Gujarat and north-western Kathiawar.

SUBSISTENCE PATTERNS
An analysis of the Palaeolithic sites in India indicates that human ancestors generally lived in open air sites or in rock or cave shelters. The sites were mostly closer to the higher river banks or the hill terraces and their location was governed by the consideration of easy availability of perennial water, enough plant and animal food and the raw material for making tools. The craft activity of the Palaeolithic people is demonstrated in the growing skill in making finer and sharper stone tools and in the selection of better and more compatible raw material.

Faunal remains give us some idea about the relationship between Palaeolithic human beings and their resources about their subsistence pattern. These remains suggest that the people were primarily in a hunting and gathering stage. However, there is no evidence of selective hunting in this period. It seems that the subsistence patterns of hunter-gatherers were geared to a dry season/wet season cycle of exploitation of plant and animal foods. It is likely that the Palaeolithic people subsisted on animals such as ox, bison, gazelle, black buck, antelope, wild boar, a variety of birds, tortoises and fishes and on honey and plant foods.

Rock paintings and carvings also give us an insight into the subsistence pattern and social life of the Palaeolithic people. The earliest paintings belong to Upper Palaeolithic. Bhimbetka is well known for continuous season of paintings of different periods. The paintings are predominantly of bisons, elephants, tigers, rhinos and boars. These paintings also reflected that Palaeolithic people lived in small band societies whose subsistence economy was based on exploitation of resources in the form of both animal and plant products. These people lived in a group of 20 or 25 and their movement was determined by the seasonal availability of food resources.

MESOLITHIC AGE
The Mesolithic Age represent a phase of transition from the preceding hunting and food gathering stage of the Palaeolithic period to that of farming and herding in the succeeding Neolithic period. It coincides with the beginning f the Holocene age, around 10,000 BP or 8,000 BC. This age witnessed a change in climate from cold and arid to warm and wet on account of the gradual recession of the glaciers. This change led to the melting of snow and the formation of rivers resulting in the growth of forests and vegetation. The technology of producing tools also underwent change; now small stone tools were being used increasingly. Although the Mesolithic man was still in hunting and gathering stage of subsistence, there was shift in pattern of hunting from big game to small game hunting, fishing, and fowling. The use of animal bones, along with stones, marked the biggest change in the life of man from the Palaeolithic age to the Mesolithic age. The beginning of the art of making clay pots is also a significant development of the Mesolithic age. There was a significant growth in population and the change in demographic profile. Microlithic or small

stone tools (their length ranging from 1 to 8 cm) comprised of tools made on blades and include burins, lunettes, crescents, triangles, points, trapeze, etc.

MESOLITHIC SITES
The Pachpadra basin and the Sojat area in Rajasthan are rich in Microliths with Tilwara and Bagor being the most important sites. Bagor on the river Kothari is the largest Mesolithic site in India where geometric Microliths are found along with shells and animal bones. Being located at the juncture of arable and fertile lands and being rich in quartz Bagor was an ideal location for the Mesolithic man whose subsistence pattern relied on his surroundings. Rock shelters excavated at Lekhakia (in Mirzapur district of southern UP) have yielded blade tools and Microliths. Burials and pottery was also found. Baghai Khor is another rock shelter site in the same area where two extended burials were identified.

In Eastern India, Microliths generally occur on the surface of laterite plains and forests in Orissa, Bengal, and the Chota Nagpur Plateau and on the rocky (sandstone) hillocks of Mirzapur. The tools were generally made of milky quartz, though crystal, chert, chalcedony, quartzite and fossil wood tools have also been found. Birbhanpur located on the river Damodar in West Bengal seems to have been both a habitation and a factory site. Mayurbhanj, Keonjhar, Kuchai and Sundergarh in Orissa; Sebalgiri in the Garo hills of Meghalaya have also yielded Microliths.

In peninsular India, Microlithic sites found in the vicinity of Mumbai seem to represent coastal Mesolithic communities who exploited marine resources for food. Further south, the Microliths are mostly made out of milky quartz. They have been found at Jalahalli and Kibbanhali near Bangalore in Karnataka, in Goa, and at Nagarjunakonda (in southern Andhra Pradesh). Sagan Kullu in Karnataka has yielded cores, flakes, points and crescents. Microliths have been reported from the Kurnool area and Renigunta in Andhra Pradesh. In the south of Chennai, tiny stone tools, mostly of quartz and chert, have been found on teris (old sand dunes). On the Vishakapatnam coast, stone tablets and ring stones have been found at sites such as Chandrampalem, Paradesipalem, and Rushikonda.

At Damdama near Sai River, Microliths, bone objects, querns and mullers, anvils, and hammer stones have been discovered. There were hearths, patches of burnt floor plaster, charred wild grains, and animal bones. Microliths have been found in the valleys of Tapi, Narmada, Mahi, and Sabarmati. One of the important site is Langhnaj. Meoslithic tools like blades and geometric Microliths made of chalcedony have been found at Bhimbetka.

SUBSISTENCE PATTERN

Floral and Faunal remains gives us ideas about the subsistence pattern whereas the burials and rock paintings gives us ideas about the development of religious practices.

The animal bones and stone tools found at various sites form the chief evidence of the subsistence pattern of the Mesolithic people. This direct evidence is supplemented by the depiction of scenes of hunting, fishing, trapping of mice, and plant food collection in the contemporary rock paintings. The early Mesolithic sites have yielded the faunal remains of cattle, sheep, buffalo, pig, bison, elephant, hippo, wolf, cheetah, black buck, and fish. The appearance and disappearance of the animals has to be understood in the context of changing climatic and environmental conditions. The diet of the people during Mesolithic Age included both meat and vegetal food. The remains of fish, tortoise, hare, mongoose, porcupine, deer, and nilgai have been found from different Mesolithic sites like Langhanaj and Tilwara and it seems these were consumed as food. At Bagor, a paved floor littered with bones has been identified by V. N. Mishra as a place for butchering animals or a slaughter house. At Bagor and Adamgarh, there is evidence of domestication of cattle, sheep, and goat. According to Allchin, sheep or goat were domesticated in this period.

The Mesolithic people also collected wild roots, tubers, hits, honey etc. and these constituted important elements in the overall dietary pattern. Some areas seem to have been rich in grass, edible roots, seeds, nuts and fruits, and people would have used them as food resources. It is difficult to establish co-relation between the animal meat and vegetal food in the context of Mesolithic age because the plant remains are perishable in nature. It can be suggested that hunting provided significant portion of the food resource. The economy was primarily based on hunting and gathering. Men lived along the banks of the rivers and foothills where raw material was easily available.

The paintings and engravings found at the rock shelters, which the Mesolithic people used, give us considerable idea about their social life and economic activities. Sites like Bhimbetka, Adamgarh, Pratapgarh and Mirzapur are rich in Mesolithic art and painting and they reflect Hunting, food gathering, fishing and other human activities. It could also be said that during the Mesolithic period, social organization had become more stable as the paintings and engravings depict activities like sexual union, childbirth, rearing of child, and burial ceremonies.

There is evidence of human burials in India at various sites such as Langhanj, Bagor, and Sarai Nahar Rai. The dead were buried inside the habitation area, and the most common form of burial was the extended burial, a body lying on the back with face upward. There is also evidence of secondary or fractional burials, having only a few bones. Sometimes, the dead were buried in a flexed position with arms and legs folded as if in sleeping position.

At Sarai Nahar Rai, a grave contains 4 individuals in 2 pairs of a male and a female each, the male being placed on the right of the female. The meticulous way in which the burials were made and the way in which the dead bodies and grave goods were placed clearly indicate the performance of some ritual at the time of death and the emergence of belief in life after death. The grave goods (like microliths and bone ornaments) obtained from the graves gives us an important insight into the material culture of the Mesolithic people. At Mahadaha, one skeleton is wearing an earring along with a necklace of beads made of antler bone. Beads of semi precious stones such as jasper and agate have been reported from Bagor, Bhimbetka, and Adamgarh. This period reveals the earliest use of ornaments and sheds enough light on the craft activity and aesthetic sensibility of the Mesolithic people.

CONCLUSION
The Pre-historic societies of hunter-gatherers are studied based on archaeological remains with the help of anthropological theories. The Palaeolithic and Mesolithic ages represent the hunting-gathering stage of social evolution. Faunal remains give us considerable idea about the subsistence pattern of Palaeolithic and Mesolithic people. During the Palaeolithic age, people were primarily in the hunting and gathering stage. People seem to have hunted large and middle-sized mammals. At the same time, they also exploited the plant foods. The hunting-gathering pattern continued during Mesolithic age. The Mesolithic phase of prehistory was characterized by the introduction of new technology in the form of material and composite tools as well as by some progress towards the domestication of animals and plant collection. From the Palaeolithic age to Mesolithic Age, there seems to have been a shift from big animal hunting to small animal hunting and fishing. The pre-historic paintings give us insight into the economic, social, and cultural life of the people.