Prehistoric India to 1000 B.C. c11.s1: The Rana Ghundai Sequence

Prehistoric India to 1000 B.C. c11.s1

Language: English

The Rana Ghundai Sequence

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(From earliest to latest strata : the letters in brackets are the pottery groups of the original report)

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It will be convenient to refer to the various periods as RG I, RG II, etc., and, although the sequence at the type-site seems likely to be valid for the whole area of settlement, it must be stressed that, until other sites are explored in the same manner, caution must be used in equating the various settlements.

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RG I is at present represented only at the type-site, but it may await discovery at the bottoms of yet unexcavated tells. But there were over 14 feet of deposits in RG I, consisting of soil in which no structural remains could be traced, though there were frequent layers of ash representing hearths; and the excavator suggested that intermittent but recurrent occupation of the site by semi-nomadic people with impermanent huts or tents seemed likely. The pottery found was all unpainted (except for a single sherd roughly painted with a lozenge pattern) and had not been turned on the wheel. There were flint blades of the types we have already encountered in South Baluchistan, but none showed any evidence of having been used as sickle-flints, and there were also two bone points and an eyed needle. The animal bones were very interesting, comprising the humped ox (Bos indicus), domestic sheep (Ovis vignei), the ass (Equus asinus), and, most surprising and important, four teeth of the domesticated horse (Equus caballus). Nomadic, horse-riding herdsmen using the site as a camping-ground are suggested by the finds in RG I; an infant’s skeleton was also found buried at this level.

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In RG II we see newcomers arriving at the site, building houses with boulder footings over the compacted debris of RG I, and making a superb painted pottery, turned on the wheel and decorated with fine stylized figures of humped bulls and of black buck, painted with great skill in black paint on a background which varies from pinkish or buff to a dark terra-cotta colour, and without the use of any secondary red colour (Fig. 13). A few sherds of the typical ‘Bull’ pottery of RG II have been found elsewhere in the Zhob Valley, notably at Sur Jangal, but the new material from Rana Ghundai enables us to see that the pots were very fine, well-made bowls, with either a foot-ring or a pedestal base, and each with a frieze of stylized bulls or black buck, in which the vertical elongation of the legs and horns is a contrast to the horizontal elongation of the Kulli animals. There is a crisper, less naturalistic handling of the RG II animals than of those in the Kulli Culture, and as we shall see there are good parallels to the style of bowls and the treatment of the animals found in Northern Persia.

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FIG. 13. Bowls painted with cattle and black buck, Rana Ghundai II phase

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The occupation of RG II does not seem to have been of very long duration, and only one building level can be traced, followed by sterile material implying temporary abandonment of the site. RG III, however, is a period of some length, with three phases of building and a continuous pottery evolution which in its turn is derived from the wares of RG II. In RG IIIa the fine brush-work of RG II continues and becomes almost an affectation—one could almost use the terms applied to a similar stylistic sequence in Danish Neolithic pottery and talk of a ‘grand style’ followed by a ‘pretty style’—and red paint appears, being used as a second colour, even though the background is itself a red slip, producing a curious ‘red-on-red’ technique. Among other patterns executed in this two-colour style are multiple-lined squares in red and black, which recall those of Amri and which might indicate approximate contemporaneity and interchange of ideas; in Amri ware too there are small pedestal feet with groups of vertical lines just in the manner of RG II and IIIa. The main occupation of the Sur Jangal site seems to be comparable with RG IIIa and with the succeeding IIIb, where tall carafe-like vessels appear, which occur also at Sur Jangal (Fig. 14). In this phase and in the

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FIG. 14. Bowls and carafe, Rana Ghundai IIIa and IIIb phases

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next, RG IIIc, the brush-work on the pottery painting coarsens and the background is almost invariably a deep red; comparable sites of this period are Periano Ghundai and Mogul Ghundai near Fort Sandeman (Fig. 15).

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The end of the RG IIIc phase seems to be violent - as we shall see in Chapter VI, there is evidence of burning, and the site may have been sacked - and at all events in RG IV and V we encounter quite different traditions in pot-making, and the continuous sequence from RG II to IIIc is broken. Before discussing these later phases, however, we can broaden our knowledge of the RG III period as a whole by considering the evidence from those other sites which have yielded pottery referable to one or more of the three sub-phases of RG III, notably Periano Ghundai, which in the main seems to be RG IIIc, and the settlement site at Nal into which the later cemetery was dug, which on the few

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FIG. 15. Cups of Rana Ghundai IIIc phase

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available pots seems also to be approximately contemporary with RG IIIc.

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The same reservations with regard to estimating the size of the settlements which I have already made for the South Baluchistan sites apply of course equally here, but on the whole the average size of the tells is much the same in both areas. Sur Jangal is very small, only about 40 yards across and 16 feet high, and at the other end of the scale is the enormous mound of Dabar Kot south of Loralai, 500 yards in diameter and 113 feet high. As this latter site has as the final occupation a Harappā settlement or trading-post, its size implies a long series of important prehistoric towns on the spot, all apparently earlier than the middle of the third millennium B.C.

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Practically nothing is known of the layout of the settlements of RG III date except at Nal, where houses with rooms or courts varying from 11 by 13 feet to tiny, thick-walled chambers only 5 feet square or less were found; at Moghul Ghundai there were traces of a possible defensive wall to the settlement. Building materials seem to have been of boulder foundations with mud bricks above on all sites where any trace could be seen, and the sizes of bricks range as follows:

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12 by 12 by 7½ in. (Nal) 13 by 6–8 by 2½ in. (Rana Ghundai) 14 by 9 by 2 in. (Periano Ghundai) 23 by 9 by 3¾ in. (Nal) 24 by 16 by 4 in. (Dabar Kot)

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The larger bricks at Nal compare in size with those from Nundara in South Baluchistan. In some rooms at Nal were rough pavings of pebbles or small stones carefully laid on gravel, and at the same site and at Rana Ghundai charred wooden beams were found. The Nal settlement had in fact been burnt down (the red colour of the earth of the tell gives it its modern name of Sohr-damb, the Red Mound); the charred remains of wooden beams and rafters, circular in section, with diameters of 9 and 5½ inches respectively, were found still in position forming two floors, 6 feet 3 inches apart, in one of the small chambers already mentioned.

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The pottery of RG III, on which we have already touched, is a consistent development from the ‘Bull’ wares of RG II. At Sur Jangal we find open bowls on a high pedestal foot painted with grouped vertical strokes; the interior of the bowl is painted with a frieze of humped cattle whose fantastically elongated legs and tails trail down to the centre of the area. This pattern often degenerates until its origin in animal forms becomes only faintly recognizable, and its original significance must have been forgotten by the painters of the more extreme examples of these abstract patterns.

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The two-colour painting at Sur Jangal is most attractive, with a brighter and more orange tone used than the deep plum-red of South Baluchistan, so that in the red-on-red pots the painted strokes show up lighter against the rich red slip. We have already noted the panels of chequers enclosed by multiple red and black lines, so similar to those of Amri and Nundara, but on the whole this class of pottery is peculiar to North Baluchistan. Also from Sur Jangal are one or two pieces of thin, hard grey-ware bowls with painted ornament in black, best paralleled in the Quetta sites and in Sistan.

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The development of the pottery in RG IIIc is very well shown at the site of Periano Ghundai. Here the red slip as a background is constant, and painting on this is in black alone, while the brush-work has become coarser. A common shape is the small beaker or bottle with a solid pedestal foot, and this type serves to link the Nal settlement with this phase (Fig. 15). There are a couple of sherds from Periano Ghundai with fairly naturalistic animals painted on them (probably a deer and a bull), and two more have fishes depicted, but otherwise the decoration is all geometric. Some fragments with hatched zones suggest comparison with Sistan sherds, though at these sites the painting is black on buff.

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In common with the Kulli Culture of South Baluchistan, the Zhob Valley sites have produced a number of clay figurines of cattle and women, and, though the stratified deposits of Rana Ghundai contained none of these, their occurrence at Sur Jangal, Periano Ghundai, Moghul Ghundai and Kaudani, as well as at Dabar Kot, suggests that they should be assigned to the RG III phase. Little need be said of the few figurines of humped bulls, but one clay figurine (from Periano Ghundai) seems to represent a horse, and is interesting in connexion with the finds of horses' teeth in RG I at the type-site.

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The female figures are, however, of great interest (Fig. 16). Like those of the Kulli Culture, they end below the waist in little pedestals, and they are also in several instances adorned with several necklaces, though these are more schematically shown than those from the southern region. But the faces are totally different – hooded with a coif or shawl, they have high, smooth foreheads above their staring, circular eye-holes, their owl-beak nose and grim slit mouth.

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The result is terrifying, even in a tiny model not more than 2 inches high, and in two from Dabar Kot all pretence is thrown aside and the face is a grinning skull. Whatever may be said of the Kulli figurines, these can hardly be toys, but seem rather to be a grim embodiment of the mother-goddess who is also the guardian of the dead – an underworld deity

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FIG. 16. Clay figurines of women, Zhob Cultures

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concerned alike with the corpse and the seed-corn buried beneath the earth.

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The fertility aspect so often connected with such underworld gods is indeed represented by other models, for which no parallels can be found in South Baluchistan. From Moghul Ghundai is a phallus carved in stone, and there is another probable example in rough pottery from Periano Ghundai, and from this site too comes a figurine consisting of an enormously exaggerated female vulva and thighs.

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Analogous evidence of fertility symbols comes from the Harappā Culture.

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Of the other elements of the material culture of the RG III phase we have a little not very illuminating evidence. The flint blades already found in RG I continue throughout RG II and III on the type site, and are also found at Sur Jangal and Periano Ghundai. From these sites too come flint points and a good leaf-shaped arrowhead, another of which was found in the nineteenth century by Noetling at Dabar Kot. Small cups of alabaster are attested by fragments from Periano Ghundai, and beads of unspecified stones from Dabar Kot and Moghul Ghundai, and of lapis and (allegedly) jade from Periano Ghundai. Bone beads were found at Dabar Kot, and bangles, needles (recalling the RG I specimen) and small disc beads of the same substance occurred at Periano Ghundai. Metal is scarce and in no instance certainly dated to RG III, but copper objects (a rod and a ring) come from Periano Ghundai, and fragments of a copper cup from Dabar Kot, the same site producing a gold pin and fragment of sheet metal, which may, however, be better referred to the Harappā occupation on the site.

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Probably to Harappā contacts must be attributed two small, square stamp-seals, one of greenish stone and the other of unknown substance and known only from a drawing by Noetling. The former is from Dabar Kot, and has a voided equal-armed cross set between small square panels at the corners, and the latter, probably from Periano Ghundai, seems from the drawing to be very similar. Harappā material is, of course, present at Dabar Kot in the form of a distinctive settlement, but scattered traces of imports from the Indus Valley can also be seen at other sites, such as the etched carnelian beads from Moghul Ghundai and Tor Dherai; and the clay bracelets from Periano Ghundai with a wavy outer edge, paralleled in the Harappā levels at Chan-hu-daro, are presumably likely to be of similar origin.

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PLATE 1. Harappā 1946: Section through mud-brick defences of citadel

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PLATE 2. Harappā 1946: Section through defences of citadel (detail)

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PLATE 3. Harappā 1946: Corn-pounding platform of brick with traces of central wooden mortar visible in section

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PLATE 4. Harappā 1916: Inhumation burials in cemetery H

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PLATE 5 Harappā 1946: Inhumation burial with remains of reed shroud, cemetery R 37

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PLATE 6. Harappā 1946: Painted Pots (black on red)

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PLATE 7. Harappā 1946: Painted Pots (black on red)

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IN CM

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PLATE 8. Harappā 1946: Clay figurines Burials which can be referred to RG III have been found at Sur Jangal, Periano Ghundai and Moghul Ghundai. At the first site a cemetery of about twenty small cairns was identified 60-70 yards away from the settlement, covering deposits of cremated bones associated with typical RG III potsherds and in one instance a flint blade, lying on the old ground surface. Somewhat similar cairns near Moghul Ghundai may also go back to this period, though the one or two dug into by Stein produced evidence of a late date, contemporary with the ‘B’ Cemetery at Sialk; but at this site and at Periano Ghundai cremation burials were found in pots, one at least under the floor of a room and another by a wall, accompanied by smaller ancillary vessels. The subsequent occupation-levels on the type site will be discussed in Chapter VI.

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When we look to the other prehistoric sites in Western Asia, in Persia and Mesopotamia, we can see that the Rana Ghundai sequence is by no means without parallel. The presumed camping sites in RG I may be compared in type to the first settlement at Tell Hassuna in Mesopotamia, though it must be stressed that the resemblance is no more than one of general similarity, since the Hassuna settlement is immensely older than even the most adventurous chronology could make that of RG I. But, with the newcomers implied by the appearance of the fine painted pottery in RG II, we can make rather more precise comparisons, for the pottery of this phase has very close affinities, in the shape of the vessels and in the style and content of the vase-painting, with that of Hissar I - the first settlement on the Hissar site near Damghan in Northern Persia. Hissar I is a typical site within the Red-ware province, and as we have seen there is a large proportion of black-on-red ware in RG II, and the red background becomes constant in RG III. The animals depicted on the pots in the two regions - North Persia and North Baluchistan - differ, presumably in response to the natural fauna and the differing types of domesticated beast in the two cultures, but apart from this the similarities are so striking that we can claim Hissar I and RG II as parallel developments within the Red-ware area. Whether we can also equate the dates of the two phases is not so certain, but the Baluchistan evidence does show that RG II must have a fair degree of priority over the Harappā Culture, and its date should therefore be well back in the fourth millennium B.C., perhaps contemporary with Jemdet Nasr. RG III would begin in Early Dynastic times and continue to overlap with the Harappā Culture in Akkadian times, or even later.

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As we shall see in Chapter VI, there was evidence of violent destruction at the end of the RG IIIc settlement; this and the similar tale told by the burning of the settlement on the Sohr-damb of Nal have some significance when we come to discuss the movements of peoples into India from the west in the second half of the second millennium. The total change in pottery types implies an extinction of the earlier culture at least at Rana Ghundai, and the barbarous quality of the pottery heavily decorated in relief which follows on the painted wares forms a striking contrast to the earlier traditions. It did not mean the end of human settlement in Baluchistan, but it must have meant a considerable reduction in the population, and yet the ancient craft of pot painter never entirely died out. From sites in the Quetta region have come pots painted with designs copied from Sassanian fabrics of the sixth and seventh centuries A.D. brought by traders through the Bolan Pass, and one has only to walk through the bazaars of Quetta or Peshawar to see set out for sale painted pots, gay with their black and red designs that so disconcertingly resemble the ancient patterns, but made the day before yesterday in the local kilns.

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Postscript. Since this book was written, Miss Beatrice de Cardi has read a paper to the Society of Antiquaries of London describing her work of reconnaissance in central Baluchistan since the war. She has extended the known distribution of Quetta Ware southwards, and amplified our knowledge of the other cultures considerably, distinguishing also a new pottery type (Togau Ware). Her discoveries on the later prehistoric sites in Baluchistan are referred to in Chapter VI.

Prehistoric India to 1000 B.C. c11.s1: The Rana Ghundai Sequence

The Rana Ghundai Sequence

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