Social distinctions during the south Indian Neolithic: changing mortuary practices in a late prehistoric cemetery at Maski

Abstract

Human burials have been recovered from a wide variety of intra- and extramural settlement contexts at Neolithic period sites (3000–1200 BC) in southern India, yet formal cemeteries remain virtually unknown from this period. Research at MARP-79 in the Raichur District of the south Indian state of Karnataka, near the type-site of Maski, documents a large Neolithic cemetery, now with the largest number of radiometrically dated burials of any archaeological site in southern India. The cemetery demonstrates considerable, previously undocumented variation in mortuary ritual, involving new materials, technologies and burial practices, which challenge culture-historical models, pointing instead towards long-term incremental developments that alter how we understand the emergence of Neolithic social differences.