The Personality of India: Pre- and Proto-historic Foundation of India and Pakistan c11.3

c11.3

After these very broad periods, the next important problem is that of an independent generic and specific terminology.¹ Upto now this problem has not received the attention it deserves. As far as Prehistory is concerned, the European terminology is being adopted and adapted. Remembering that things which may have the same name in Prehistory are not necessarily the same in time or content, we may try to avoid the pitfalls into which European and African developments have landed. In Europe, after the brilliant generalization of Thompsen, his Three Age scheme has been so much systematized and garnished with sub-divisions that it is impossible to see the wood for the trees.² But the more intensive studies both in Europe, as well as in Africa, have shown that Western Europe itself has a provincial character of its own, on account of its location on the periphery of the Old World. Childe has recently demonstrated how the geographical and environmental differences in Europe itself have lead to what he calls, "culture cycles" which consist of a series or groups of cultures which are linked, but yet have an individuality of their own.³ As Lowe put it, "the dangers of a universal or a wide application of cultural terms, founded on typological similarities, are too obvious to need stress. On the other hand, the universal application of terms used to describe techniques has few dangers." Hence the classic tradition, either of Europe or Africa, should not intrude into India. But we should gradually evolve our own terminology, as fresh investigations are carried out. Hence our approach should be the isolation and correlation of persistent associations of archaeological types and not splitting preconceived groupings of human remains. This system has the other advantage of avoiding the confusion and mis-understanding, due to the projection by implication, of the total cultural and chronological associations of two far-fetched areas, belonging to two entirely different physical environments. Besides, the large environmental diversity and overlaps of cultural phases make any system very difficult to apply in practice.