Before Farming: the archaeology and anthropology of hunter-gatherers

Destruction of Acheulian Sites

Destruction of Acheulian Sites in the Hunsgi and Baichbal Valleys of the Deccan, India

The Hunsgi and Baichbal Valleys, located in the Deccan region of India, constitute an erosional basin with an extent of about 500 sq km. These valleys have preserved a rich record of Stone Age sites ranging in age from the Lower Palaeolithic to the Mesolithic. The area has a particularly dense concentration of Acheulian sites. Small and large ones considered together, there are about 200 occurrences; these have been the focus of my research for the last quarter-century. Four of these sites have been excavated, the last one being the site of Isampur which is dated by ESR method to about 1.2 million years (Paddayya et al, in press). My article on 'The Acheulian culture project of the Hunsgi Baichbal valleys, peninsular India' (Paddayya 2001) provides a comprehensive account of the Acheulian culture of the area from a settlement system perspective and of the techno-typological and other behavioural attributes of the Acheulian hunter-gatherers.

Map showing the distribution of Acheulian sites in Hunsgi and Baichbal Valleys, Human Roots: Africa and Asia in the Middle Pleistocene Barham and Robson-Brown (click on the image for a printable version)

While I do have a robust feeling of satisfaction for having brought this area onto the Lower Palaeolithic map of the Old World, it is simultaneously depressing to note that much of this Stone Age record has undergone a drastic transformation during the last decade because of important changes in land management introduced in the area. Introduction of irrigation is one single factor which has drastically changed the face of the landscape in this region.

The construction of a giant dam at Narayanpur on the major river Krishna, facilitated the introduction of irrigation into the area in 1985. As a result, monsoon-fed dry farming crops like the Great Indian millet (jowar), pearl millet (bajra), groundnut and horsegram have been replaced by commercial crops like sunflower, cotton and chillies.

The preparation of the valley floor to receive waters for irrigation from the main reservoir has been a long and elaborate one. The following are the major steps undertaken by the Government/ farmers in preparing this area for irrigation:

1 reclamation of virgin lands for agricultural purposes
2 land levelling making use of bulldozers and tractors; digging of large amounts of soil sediment to fill up low-lying areas
3 layout and digging of a network of canals ranging from the main canal to field channels for receiving waters from the reservoir on the Krishna
4 deep ploughing employing power-driven tractors
5 as part of the overall development of the area the Government has also undertaken a series of other measures which entailed significant changes to the landscape. These steps included construction of new roads to interconnect villages, establishment of small industrial units such as cement factories, location of agricultural stations, and housing expansion in the form of large irrigation camps and colonies for the economically deprived.

All these developments have drastically altered the contours of the landscape. Many habitation and grave sites of the Neolithic, Iron Age and historical periods have either suffered total destruction or have undergone a great amount of alteration. Celebrated Iron Age sites like the dolmens at Rajankolur and stone circles at Jewargi (both discovered in the middle of the 19th century by Meadows Taylor and excavated by him employing the principle of stratigraphy) are now completely altered.

In such situations of swift landscape changes one can easily visualise the condition of Stone Age sites (Acheulian and other phases) which are nothing more than thin lenses (10 to 20 cm thick) of cultural material of limited horizontal extent. Moreover, most of these sites are of the sub-surface type and are covered by shallow sediments ranging from a few centimetres to half a metre in thickness. It is therefore not surprising that over the last 10 to 12 years a large number of the Acheulian sites, hitherto preserved well under dry farming conditions, have suffered considerable disturbance or alteration because of these landscape changes. Changes in the vertical and horizontal contexts of levels, leading to loss in varying degrees of the discreteness of the cultural materials, are the most common impacts. Despite these changes one could still recognize the original spots at many places.

What I want to report here is that the field situations of these Acheulian sites have now become more deplorable. During my visits to the area in March 2001 and March 2002 I have noticed a more serious menace facing the Stone Age sites.

This is the introduction of paddy cultivation. Paddy cultivation, unlike light irrigation adopted in the case of crops like chillies, sunflower and cotton, demands perfect land levelling and field bunding for impounding water. Many of the sites belonging to the Acheulian clusters lying along the Fatepur nullah in Baichbal valley and the Hunsgi nulla in Hunsgi valley are affected because of the introduction of this new crop. Large stretches of land along these watercourses containing many in situ Acheulian sites have been levelled and already converted into paddy fields by enterprising farmers who migrated from neighbouring areas. Save for an occasional stone artifact, there is no trace left of the original Stone Age sites. In this process even the excavated Acheulian localities at Hunsgi and Yediyapur (Paddayya 1982; 1987) have suffered total destruction. The process of land levelling is still in progress, which means that the small number of sites left intact will also soon be erased out of existence from the land surface.

I am totally depressed by the loss of these sites. My only consolation is that I prepared a full record of these sites before the introduction of new land use patterns. I have also tried to create a certain amount of awareness about the Stone Age past among the local people by inviting villagers, government officers, and school and college students and teachers to see our excavations. A permanent display of actual material of various cultural stages has been created in the village community hall at Hunsgi. What is alarming is that new land use patterns similar to these already initiated in the Hunsgi and Baichbal valleys are being experienced in other areas too in India where little or no work has been done. There is clearly a need for enacting Cultural Resource Management legislation similar to that being practised in North America, Australia and North European countries. From this point of view a big responsibility rests on the archaeological community in India to impress upon the Government the need for quick and rigorous steps of cultural resource management.

Reported by:

Professor K Paddayya dakshina@pn2.vsnl.net.in
Professor of Geoarchaeology
Deccan College
PUNE 411006
India

References:

Paddayya, K 1982. The Acheulian Culture of the Hunsgi Valley (Peninsular India): A Settlement System Perspective. Pune: Deccan College.

Paddayya, K 1987. Excavation of an Acheulian occupation site at Yediyapur, peninsular India. Anthropos 82: 610-614.

Paddayya, K 1996. Modern impacts on archaeological sites in India: a case study from the Shorapur Doab, Karnataka. Man and Environment 21(2): 75-88.

Paddayya, K 2001. The Acheulian culture project of the Hunsgi Baichbal valleys, peninsular India. In Barham, L and Robson-Brown K (eds) Human roots: Africa and Asia in the Middle Pleistocene. Bristol: Western Academic & Specialist Press.

Paddayya, K, Blackwell, BAB, Jhaldiyal, R, Petraglia, MD, Fevrier, S, Chaderton II, DA, Blickstein JIB and Skinner AR. In press. Recent findings on the Acheulian culture of the Hunsgi and Baichbal valleys, Karnataka, with special reference to the Isampur excavation and its dating. Current Science (Bangalore).