ASIA, SOUTH | Neolithic Cultures

Abstract

The Neolithic period marks a major watershed in economy, social organization and technology. Although the Neolithic was initially recognized on the basis of a change in lithic technology, the production of ground stone axes, it soon came to be seen to relate to major changes in subsistence (food production), settlement pattern (sedentism), in cooking and food container technology (ceramics), and in the production of textiles. In India, as in other parts of the world, various traits of the Neolithic did not evolve simultaneously and thus research has begun to clarify the ordering and interrelationships of these changes. Through most of South Asia there is not a clear cultural or economic change associated with the beginnings of copper-working and an understanding of early food production invariably must consider sites from periods when copper is in use. Thus, scholars often talk of the Neolithic-Chalcolithic cultures and distinguish these from the earlier Mesolithic and the later Iron Age. In general terms, seven distinct Neolithic traditions can be defined in South Asia, and the development of settled village farming societies can be understood as developing from these regional traditions or interactions between them. In general, the emergence of Neolithic societies is recognizable by groundstone axes, food production, and/or ceramic manufacture during the Middle Holocene, as early as the late seventh millennium BC in the northwest and as late as c. 2000BC in other parts of India. Despite the different dates at which the Neolithic began in various parts of India and Pakistan, many of these developments must be seen in terms of local processes of social evolution and environmental change.