An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology v1.c20.s1.t2: 15.1.2 Middle Pleistocene
An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology v1.c20.s1.t2
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15.1.2 Middle Pleistocene
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The Middle Pleistocene faunal evidence comes mostly from the NARMADA VALLEY. Next only to the Siwaliks this valley has yielded the richest mammalian fossils found in India, this time of the Middle Pleistocene, many of them found in association with Stone Age tools which makes the valley very significant to the origins of man. The region constitutes one of the great hunting grounds of India. Even today large cats, bears, gaurs, deer and black-bucks are found in forests. Many of the ancestors of these animals lie buried in the Pleistocene deposits along with other mammals such as the elephant, hippopotamus, horse and rhinoceros. The first authentic list of the vertebrate fossils from the valley was given by Pilgrim, 1905, who treated the NARMADA and the GODAVARI VALLEYS as of contemporary age. The fauna listed by him is as follows: *Ursus namadicus*; *Bubalus palaeindicus*; *Leptobos frazeri*; *Bos namadicus*; *Cervus duvauceli*; *Sus* sp.; *Hippopotamus namadicus*; *Equus namadicus*; *Rhinoceros unicornis*; *Stegodon insignis*; *Stegodonganesa*; *Hippopotamus palaeindicus*; and *Pangsura tectum*.
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Most of the above genera do exist down the present day. *Bubalus palaeindicus* and *Cervus duvauceli* seem to be related to the modern Indian buffalo and the *barasinga* (the swamp deer) respectively. Reptiles like *Pangsura tectum* are also identical with the reptiles living in the Indian rivers today. *Stegodon insignis*, *Stegodonganesa*, *Equus namadicus* and possibly *Hippopotamus namadicus* are survivals from the Siwaliks of n. India. *Elephas namadicus* is identical with *Elephas antiquus* of Europe. *Bos namadicus* is profusely represented in the Pleistocene deposits of peninsular India. In fact *Bos namadicus* survives well into the Holocene, its bones having been found in excavations at Mohenjo-daro (Sewell and Guha, 1931) and Langhnaj (Clutton-Brock, 1965). Pilgrim, 1939, considers *Bos acutifrons* of the Siwaliks as a possible ancestor of *Bos namadicus* which in turn is supposed to have given rise to the present-day Indian cattle *Bos indicus* (Badam, 1978).
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De Terra and Paterson, 1939, added two turtles, *Trionyx* sp. and *Emys* sp., to the above list and opined that the fauna of the Upper Narmada Group is similar to that of the Lower Narmada Group and that both carry Middle Pleistocene elements. Colbert, 1942, brought to notice two more species from the Narmada, viz., *Holarctos namadicus* and *Palaeoloxodon namadicus*. Subsequently *Elephas maximus*, *Elephas hysudricus*, *Bubalus bubalis*, *Equus caballus*, *Crocodylus palaeindicus* and *Gavialis* sp. were reported by Supekar, 1968, and the author, 1976.
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Some fossils found in the Narmada valley definitely represent the forerunners of the present-day animals as indicated by the well-preserved features of the dentition and other osteological parts. The total complex of the faunal remains indicates that the valley was a vast savannah land punctuated by flood-plain lakes and swamps in which flourished a rich assemblage of hoofed mammals and reptiles. However it may be emphasized that the existing tropical climate in the area does not show any significant departure from the past one, so that the valley provided a favourable ecosystem where some of the animals which migrated from the n.-w. because of climatic rigour in the glacial periods of the Early Pleistocene could survive almost up to 20000 years ago.
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On the basis of fauna, the author, 1976 has suggested the following litho-, bio- and chrono-stratigraphy for the Narmada Stone Age cultures. Gravel II of the Upper Narmada Group has yielded typical Upper Pleistocene fauna. A single ¹⁴C date from around Devakachar and nitrogen tests carried on bones from Sagunaghat and Devakachar by K.P. Oakley confirm this dating. Similarly the comparative study of faunal material of the Upper Narmada Group with the fauna from the Older Alluvium of the GODAVARI and Bhima in peninsular India also supports the dating of the Upper Group of Narmada to the late Pleistocene (40000 to 10000 B.P.).
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In view of the post-diagenetic changes of flood-plain silts capping the Boulder Conglomerate (Gravel I) of the Lower Narmada Group and the occurrence of a few mammalian species in the Boulder Conglomerate like *Hexaprotodon sivalensis* (Dassarma and Biswas, 1978) which are totally absent in the Upper Group, it appears that the Boulder Conglomerate/Red Clay has a far greater antiquity than the Upper Group. Thus the Lower Group could be tentatively dated as late Middle Pleistocene to early Upper Pleistocene (150000 to 40000 B.P.). The Stone Age tools found in the Boulder Gonglomerate belong to this period and therefore represent one of the earliest remains of Stone Age Man in peninsular India.
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For bibliography see below 15.1.4