The Personality of India: Pre- and Proto-historic Foundation of India and Pakistan c14.s1.t7.88

c14.s1.t7.88

The next phase shows a wider distribution in space in Saurashtra, and by this time we have a large number of sites covering the entire peninsula of Kathiawad. At Rangpur, the Harappan survives in a modified form and is described by the excavator as IIB. At Somnath, however, the earliest phase is characterized by the occurrence of corrugated or broadly incised ware with a typical blade industry of agate, chalcedony, with crested ridges. On account of the thinness of the deposits, and the general resemblance of these incised decorations with the painted designs on the Late Kathiawad Harappan (Rangpur IIB), this has been provisionally described as Somnath Ia.⁴ Somnath Ib, is characterized "by the appearance of painted pottery in profuse quantities. The shapes and painted patterns comprised two distinct traditions—the one represented by the late Harappan ceramics of Gujarat consisting of the dish-on-stand, sauce-pan handle, etc., and the other by the round bowl with an incurved and bevelled rim distinctively painted with panelled patterns somewhat similar to the motifs on the Chalcolithic painted pottery of Central India.¹ For convenience this can be described further as "Prabhas Ware". Further, a few sherds with paintings in brown, black or violet on a white or creamy slip resemble those from Ahar as well as Navdatoli. At Lakhabawal, on the north coast of Kathiawad, the lowest phase belongs to Somnath Ib, though a very few sherds of the Prabhas ware were found.