Mesolithic Prehistory

susmita — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 01:29:03 CDT

Mandla Prehistory: Danger of Existence

Microlithic sites are found almost hither and thither in the whole of the district of Mandla. It is quite evident that the Stone Age men lived and roamed all over the region leaving remains of their artifacts scattered all over. Most of the sites having invaluable archaeological materials, however, are currently under threat. The earth removing (also stone quarrying) activities for commercial purposes, which are going on in the district quite extensively these days, are posing serious threat to the survival of archaeological remains. One of the most important sites ‘Manadei’ is soon to be destroyed completely, as extensive earth digging activities is going on in and around the place. To prevent damage to invaluable prehistoric resources of the district a thorough survey of the whole region is urgently needed in the pursuit of documenting whatever still remains to be discovered, and then to suggest appropriate conservation measures, at least for some of the important sites. We can have an on the site (in-situ) prehistoric museum. This not only would be helpful to preserve the archaeological remains in its original state but also would be of vital tourist attraction. The Kanha National Park is already an important tourist spot. Archeological Site Museum could enhance the tourism industry a bit further directly or indirectly contributing towards the economic growth of this poor tribal district, ‘Mandla’.

Name of the Place/ Village/ Block	Geographical Location	Distance/ Approach road	Tool Assemblage/ A Brief Description
1. Amdra (Block: Narayanganj).	800 (18' 48" to 19' 20") East Longitude and 220 (50' 30" to 51') North Latitude.	About 10 km from Partala (forest road).	This appears to be predominantly a microlithc site (Not fully explored).
2. Babaiha forest (Block: Mandla).	800 (19' 25" to 19' 45") East Longitude and 220 (44' to 44' 10") North Latitude.	About 18 km from Mandla on the Mandla-Jabalpur road.	Microlithic assemblage includes fluted-core, parallel-sided blank blades, a few lunates and backed blades. This site has yielded at least two different types of pottery wares and a dozen of fireplaces (not yet excavated). The fireplaces are exposed, except being covered with a thin layer sediments deposited over the years, and their real association with that of the Stone Age cultural remains is doubtful or still to be established. Since being exposed they hardly could be of any value for Carbon Dating.
3. Chiri (Block: Narayanganj).	800 (16' 30" to 17') East Longitude and 220 (49' 10" to 49' 30") North Latitude.	About 35km from Mandla on the Mandla-Jabalpur road.	Microlithic assemblage includes blank-blades (parallel sided), fluted cores (different types) and a few pieces of lunate and backed blades. Most of the remains are debit age. This is predominantly a microlithic site stretching about ½ km area on the foothills. Adjacent to these sites there are several spots containing unused rocks seemed to be gathered by the stone age men while quarrying the site. The whole of the Chiri site has been highly disturbed by recent plowing activities.
4. Dongar Mandla (Block: Ghugri).	800 (36' 35" to 37') East Longitude and 220 (38' to 38' 20") North Latitude.	About 44 km from Mandla on the Mandla-Ghugri (block headquarters) road.	This is usually a microlithic site (Not fully explored).
5. Dobha (Block: Narayanganj).	800 (23' 10" to 23' 50") East Longitude and 220 (48' 35" to 49') North Latitude.	About 35 km from Mandla via Phulsagar on the Mandla-Niwash road.	This appears to be predominantly a microlithic site (Not fully explored).
6. Dobhi (Block: Narayanganj).	800 (22' 20" to 22' 35") East Longitude and 220 (49' to 49' 20") North Latitude.	About 35 km from Mandla via Phulsagar on the Mandla-Nwash road.	This appears to be predominantly a microlithc site (Not fully explored).
7. Gadhar forest (Block: Mandla).	800 (19' 20" to 19' 25") East Longitude and 220 (44' 30" to 44' 35") North Latitude.	About 20 km from Mandla on the Mandla-Jabalpur road. This site is almost adjacent to the Babaiha forest site on the other side of the road.	This has yielded the most important dating clue to the microlithic industry in the district. It is found that electrical porcelain insulator was used as raw material in making microliths.
8. Ghugra (Block: Mandla).	800 (26' 25" to 26' 30") East Longitude and 220 (34' 45" to 35') North Latitude.	About 18 km from Mandla on the Mandla-Ghugri (block headquarters) road. Madhpuri is an important village adjacent to the village Ghugra.	Microliths along with a few pieces of scrapers are found. This site seems to be heavily disturbed by human activates. Remains of Stone Age are also found as occasional pieces within the current village settlement.
9. Gullukhoh (Block: Ghugri).	800 (34' 45" to 35' 5") East Longitude and 220 (38' to 38' 05") North Latitude.	About 43 km from Mandla on the Mandla-Ghugri (block headquarters) road.	Microliths as well as heavy Stone Age tools (point and scrapers of different types). This site has yielded a cleaver like tool, one perforated stone piece (typology not clear), and a peculiar three sided point like tool having all the three edges secondarily worked by trimming and thus leaving no butt end for holding or hafting it into an implement. Plowing activities has disturbed most part of the site. This is the only site that has yielded a large tool, typologically a cleaver like. However, the withering pattern does no speak for any greater antiquity of the specimen.
10. Kachnari (Block: Ghugri).	800 (50' 15" to 50' 20") East Longitude and 220 (46' 30" to 46' 35") North Latitude.	15 km from Chabri (on the Mandla-Dindori road).	This is predominantly a microlithic site (Not fully explored).
11. Kunmha (Block: Narayanganj)	800 (15' to 16') East Longitude and 220 (48' 45" to 49') North Latitude.	About 37km from Mandla on the Mandla-Jabalpur road.	Only a very few microliths are found amidst huge rock nodules scattered over a vast area of more than a kilometer stretch. This site has yielded one of the finished pieces of arrowhead (or point) made on a flake. Only a few pieces of worked stone (blades and cores) were found amidst several hundreds of unused rock pieces. This looks to be a quarry site having heaps of detritus (un-worked or natural rocks) scattered over a large area.
12. Kui (Block: Narayanganj)	800 (18' 19" to 19' 20") East Longitude and 220 (51' 10" to 51' 40") North Latitude.	About 15 km from Partala.	This appears to be predominantly a microlithic site (Not fully explored).
13. Mandla (village Gonjhi) (Block: Mandla)	800 (20' 30" to 20' 35") East Longitude and 220 (38' to 39') North Latitude.	The district headquarters town of Mandla is about 95 km from Jabalpur.	Microliths collected from a number of spots or clusters on the bank of the river Narmada at 4 or 5 km from the town of Mandla proper on the way to Jabalpur. The village Gonjhi has informal claim over the area. None of the sites gives concentrated deposition of stone age remains. However, occasional finds of microlithic remains suggest that Stone Age men once inhabited the whole of the current Mandla township. Over the years the activities in the town have destroyed much of the remains of the Prehistoric culture.
14. Manadei (Block: Mandla)	800 (20' 40" to 21') East Longitude and 220 (37' 30" to 37' 35") North Latitude.	About 6 km from Maharajpur/ Mandla on the Mandla/ Maharajpur-Bhainsadah road.	Microliths as well as Upper Paleolithic tools like points, different types of scrapers, blades and cores. This is one of the most important Stone Age sites discovered in the district so far. This is a large site over an area of about a kilometer stretch. There are clear proofs that people occupied the site repeatedly during different time periods. Some of the tools seem to be reused in the next phase, perhaps several thousand years later. The fresh flaking marks (or working edge) on stone pieces already used in earlier phase are clear proof of that. This site shows the maximum presence of the upper Paleolithic tools types: blade core, parallel-sided blades, scrapers of different types and points. This site also abounds with microliths, which seem to be handy works of people who occupied the site much later in the time frame. People using microliths occupied places closer to river indicating that they were more dependent upon that, might be for fishing, than their early Paleolithic predecessors.
15. Partala (Block: Narayanganj)	800 (18' to 19' ) East Longitude and 220 (50' to 50' 20") North Latitude.	About 36 km (of which 5km is kacha road) from Mandla on the Mandla-Jabalpur road.	Microliths (blades and fluted cores) found in association with heavy tools (different types of scrapers, points and large blades, blade core and flakes). This site also has yielded one chopper chopping like tool. Through out the village, remains of Stone Age are found scattered. However, there are at least two distinct clusters having the stone age deposits, one just a km away from the village on the forest road leading to the Narayangang block headquarters town (predominantly microlithic site) where stone tools were found scattered on either sides of the road, and the other one at ½ km away on the way towards the adjacent village Amdra/Basin tolla (mixed site of large stone tools and microliths) where stone tools were found on the left side of the road. These two clusters located at forest, and are practically outside the village territory, although the people have in-formal claim over that part of the range.
16. Ramnagar (Block: Bichia)	800 (30' 15" to 30' 30") East Longitude and 220 (37' to 37' 25") North Latitude.	About 30 km from Mandla on the Mandla-Ghugri (block headquarters) road.	Riverbed collection of heavy tools: different types of scrapers, flakes, and cores. The river has deposited several thousands of chipped stones on either side of the banks, but mostly on the Ramnagar side. Many of these deposits exhibit heavy withering giving a proof for antiquity of the Stone Age culture in the district.
17. Bhainsadah (Block: Mandla)	800 (18' 45" to 19') East Longitude and 220 (40' 25" to 41' 10") North Latitude.	About 16 km from Maharajpur/ Mandla on the Mandla/ Maharajpur-Bhainsadah road.	This is predominantly a microlithic site starching over 1 km (Not fully explored).

Write to: Dr. BABUL ROY, Fatashil, G.S. Colony, Guwahati – 781009, Assam (India). E-mail: <babul_roy@ hotmail.com > Telephone: 09971031300 (m) [use ISTD code]

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susmita — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 06:47:51 CDT

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Personal Information

susmita — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 03:57:42 CDT

Dr. Babul Roy, M.Sc, Ph.D (Anthropology)

1. Professional Field Experience:
Dr. Roy has traveled extensively in India. He has got anthropological field experiences in Mandla (Madhya Pradesh), Central Indian Himalaya (e.g. Badrinath, Munsiyari, etc.), and North East Indian States. He has got extensive field work experiences for over a decade in North Cachar Hills among the Dimasa Kachari and Zeme Naga tribes. He is currently compiling a full length monograph on Zeme Naga tribe.
2. Original Discovery:
He has discovered for the first time more than a dozen of prehistoric (microlithic) sites in Mandla (Madhya Pradesh).
3. Articles & Papers:
He has published a large number of scholarly papers on different topics of social anthropology and prehistoric archaeology.
4. Permanent Address:
C/o Bimal Chandra Roy, Fatashil Pukhuri par, G. S. Colony, Guwahati – 781009 Assam Tel. No. (m) 09971031300 E-Mail: < babul_roy@hotmail.com >

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susmita — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 05:16:31 CDT

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Dr. Babul Roy, (b.1967, Indian by Nationality) has been trained in Anthropology and Prehistoric Archaeology from Gauhati University (Assam). He has conducted extensive field research in different parts of India extended from North East Indian States to Central Himalayan States of Uttaranchal and Central Indian State of Madhya Pradesh. In 2002 while doing field research in Mandla (Madhya Pradesh) as a team member of the Oversees Development Institute, U.K, he has discovered more than a dozen of prehistoric archaeological sites (of Mezolithic period). The intention of this website is to share some of the unpublished but important stories of Dr. Roy as an anthropologist and prehistoric archaeologist. Also see: http://highland.trf.or.th/News1/SEAnews/SEAnewletter/SEAN15$.pdf http://www.insulators.com/clubs/bric/aug03.htm
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No part of the text and picture content in this site is to be quoted or used, other than for narrow academic purposes, without written permission from the author. For permission please write to Dr. Babul Roy at < babul_roy@hotmail.com >

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