The Acheulean of peninsular India with special reference to the Hungsi and Baichbal valleys of the lower Deccan

Abstract

The Indian subcontinent occupies an important place in the study of the Lower Paleolithic of the Old World. Recent discoveries at Riwat near Peshawar in Pakistan (Dennell et al., 1988a, 1988b; Dennell, this volume) and Isampur in lower Deccan suggest that the age of the subcontinent’s Lower Paleolithic stretches beyond 1.0Ma. Intensive regional surveys and systematic excavations over the last half-century have brought to light an incredibly large number and variety of Lower Paleolithic localities from diverse geographical settings ranging from the sub-Himalayan zone to coastal tracts of the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea (Sankalia, 1974; Paddayya, 1984; Misra, 1987, 1989; Petraglia, 1998, 2001; Pappu, 2001; Dennell, 2002) (Figure 1). The Indian subcontinent and its Lower Paleolithic record have found a place in recent reviews devoted to hominin origins and dispersals in the Old World (Bar-Yosef, 1998; Clark, 1998; Dennell, 1998, 2003; Petraglia, 2005). The Indian Lower Paleolithic has two different lithic tool traditions. The Soanian, the lesser known among the two, is characterized by unifacial and bifacial pebble tools (i.e., choppers, chopping tools). Lithic assemblages representing this tradition are known from the sub-Himalayan zone – the wellknown Soan culture sequence worked out by De Terra and Paterson (1939; Paterson and Drummond, 1962). Pebble-tool assemblages have also been reported from the Siwaliks (Sharma, 1977; Verma, 1991) and from a few localities in peninsular India (Khatri, 1962; Ansari,1970;Armand,1983;Rajendran,1989). But one must admit that all these lithic assemblages are derived from secondary contexts and are devoid of chronometric dates. Serious doubts have also been expressed about the Soan culture-sequence put forward byDeTerra and Paterson (Dennell and Rendell, 1991).