Early India and Pakistan to Ashoka c6.s3.22

c6.s3.22

[Figure: Fig. 9] Setting aside for the moment the blade-and-scraper groups such as the 'Upper Pravara' which may prove to be the nucleus of a widespread Upper Palaeolithic, we are left with three main Early-Mid Palaeolithic series: A, the large-flake Pre-Soan industries; B, the pebble points and choppers represented pre-eminently by the main Soan succession; and C, the Madras handaxes and cleavers. Of these, Series A stands for the time-being in isolation. The Boulder Conglomerate in which it occurs has been equated tentatively with the Boulder Conglomerate of the Madras Red Hills which has yielded pebble-tools of the 'pebble-handaxe' type along with biface core tools and flakes;²⁸ but the equation lacks all evidence, and cannot be used as an indication that pebble-tools appear earlier in south India than in the north. It must be accepted that pebble-choppers are significantly dominant in the north (the Punjab), although on a number of sites handaxes occur with them as a subordinate element. In central India the position is reversed; the handaxes are now in the ascendant, and south of the Narbadā and Orissa the pebble-choppers are in a small minority.