Mesolithic Culture Excavated Sites–Findings Revealed!

Basic information gathered from the excavated sites of Mesolithic culture are as follows:

1. Chronology:

Mesolithic people had not only achieved their special adaptation but also settled in artificially erected structures in as early as 8,000 BC. This, in other words, can be taken to indicate that the time of onset of this culture agrees with the same in both Europe and Africa.

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So far we have only one site with such an early date from India (Sarai Nahar Rai). The rest of the sites range from 5000 BC (Bagor) to 2000 BC (Langhnaj).

2. Technology and Art:

(a) Most of these sites show total adaptation to microliths and do not contain any such heavy tools as picks and axes. Use of bones like the shoulder blade of a rhinoceros found at Langhnaj indicates the aspect of non-lithic (other than stone) environment used. Antlers or, for that matter, ivory are rarely used in Indian Mesolithic.

Haematite with evidence of its having been rubbed, and spherical stone balls used as sling bolas are the other important features of the Mesolithic way of life and their hunting method.

Some of the rock paintings discovered from Mirzapur district in Uttar Pradesh and Bhimbhetka from Madhya Pradesh would be isolated from the large number of art executions as being of Mesolithic antiquity.

All these show animal forms with isolated hunting and fishing scenes. The hunting implements are spears with multiple barbs apparently obtained easily by attaching mircoliths.

(b) That inter-group fight or warfare is not merely a conjecture for this period is proved by the skeleton found at Sarai Nahar Rai with a microlith embedded into one of its ribs. The characteristic tool of Mesolithic culture in India is mircolith and microliths with the length ranging from 1 to 8 cm are the main industry of this period.

It is obvious that such tools could have been used only as composite tools hafted in wood or bovine jaws, and not singly. We have evidence of such hafting from abroad but none from India.

At Bhimbhetka, there is evidence of a special structure erected outside the cave mouth to act as a wind break. At Bagor, natural concrete from river bed seems to have been specially transported to the living site to pave the living floor.

3. Hunting Economy:

At Adamgarh, a large number of animal bones found to be domesticated finds were mainly suitable for hunting functions. The domesticated animals could not have been taken to indicate pastoral economy because there were about six varieties of mammals found in this domesticated group.

Further, Adamgarh is a cave site and pastorals cannot live in caves for longer duration. Apparently our information about this site is not quite complete. If may be representing a younger industry.