Pre Historic India (Stone Age)
2. Pre Historic India (Stone Age)
70000 - 50000 BC: Migrations to India through Land bridges
8000 - 5000 BC: Rock art in Bhimbetka, Bhopal, state of Madhya Pradesh.
Isolated remains of Homo erectus in Hathnora in the Narmada Valley in Central India indicate that India might have been inhabited somewhere between 200,000 to 500,000 years ago. Recent finds in Tamil Nadu (at c. 75,000 years ago, before and after the explosion of the Toba volcano) indicate the presence of the first anatomically modern humans in the area.
2.1 Edakkal Caves are two natural caves located 1000 meters high on Ambukutty Mala25 km from Kalpetta in the Wayanad district of Kerala in India's Western Ghats.Inside the caves are pictorial writings believed to be from neolithic man, evidence of the presence of a prehistoric civilization existing in this region. Such Stone Age carvings are
very rare and these are the only
known examples in southern India. The petroglyphs inside the cave are of at least three distinct types. The oldest may date back over 8000 years ago. Evidence indicates that the Edakkal caves had been inhabited at several different times in history.
2.2. Before 3000 BC Artifacts dating back to as much as 500,000 years have been found in Prehistoric Rock Art Cave 3, Bhimbetka The "caves" (actually, deep overhangs)of Bhimbetka, near Bhopal in Madhya Pradesh, were decorated with art beginning in the Neolithic period (approximately 8000 BC) and continuing in some caves into historic times. According to alocal guide, the paintings in Cave 3 date to 5,000 BC. All Bhimbetka dates in the following pages are quoted as they were recited by this guide.
2.3. Prehistoric Rock Art Cave 4,Bhimbetka Date quoted as 8,000 BC. Aplentiful herd of different kinds of game is depicted here.
2.4. Prehistoric Rock Art Cave 6, Bhimbetka Date quoted as 8,000 BC.
2.5. Prehistoric Rock Art Cave 8, Bhimbetka Date quoted as 3,000 BC. However, note the horse riders. 3,000 BC seems quite early for the domestication of the horse in India, which more likely accompanied the Aryan invasions of the second millennium BC.
2.6. Mehrgarh, (Urdu: ?????? ) one of the most important Neolithic (7000 BC to c. 2500
sites in archaeology, lies on what is now the "Kachi plain"oftoday's Balochistan,Pakistan.
ExcavatedbyFrench archeologists in the year 1973, this city contains six mounds with different strata of early settlements. The oldest mound showed a Neolithicvillagewhichdates to 6000 BC. It is one of the earliest sites with evidence of farming (wheat and barley) and herding (cattle, sheep and goats) in South Asia. In April 2006, it was announced in the scientific journal Nature that the oldest (and first early Neolithic) evidence in human history for the drilling of teeth in vivo (i.e. in a living person) was found in Mehrgarh. Findings clearly showed that transition from nomadic huntsmen to mature agriculturists occurred very early in these settlements. Sometime in the middle of 3000-2000 BC Mehrgarh was suddenly abandoned.
