Recently Discovered Middle Palaeolithic Foothill Site at Kundakhai in the Southern Bargarh Upland of Odisha: A Preliminary Report

Abstract

The present report is the result of our intensive investigation conducted in the southern part of the Bargarh upland, Odisha with particular reference to an inselberg located close to the village of Kundakhai. The most interesting aspect of the lithic assemblage recovered from this site a pre-dominance of Levallois elements the assemblage includes cores, flakes, a very few blades and bladelets, a solitary example of a semi-handaxe of chert, The quartzite hammers were imported most probably imported from the Ong river valley, about 8 kilometers south of the Kundakhai site. Except the two hammers and the semi-finished handaxe imported from nearby sources located within a radius of about 8 kilometers, all other artefacts recovered from this site are made on silicified rock of which the inselberg is formed. The assemblage recovered from the site is predominantly flake-based, with a near absence of blades and bladlets. The flakes are exclusively made on locally available rock source. In terms of raw material use and other aspects, the studied assemblage completely differs from the Middle Palaeolithic sites widely distributed in the upper Jira River of the northern part of the Bargarh uplands, where artefacts are mostly made on medium-fine grained quartzite abundantly available in the Debrigarh-Lohara masiff, thus showing Middle Palaeolithic assemblage variability in the studied region.