An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology v1.c9.s15.6

v1.c9.s15.6

The PGW occurs practically in entire Punjab and Haryana and in n. Rajasthan and w. Uttar Pradesh. In a late form, in which the fabric becomes coarser and the paintings very fugitive, it occurs as far s. as UJJAIN and as far e. as VAIŚĀLĪ. It may well turn out that there were three stages of the spread of the culture. The earliest would be that in n. Rajasthan along the SARASVATĪ and parts of Punjab and Haryana, in which iron had perhaps not yet come into use. The second would be the stage of w. Uttar Pradesh, when sites like HASTINĀPURA, MATHURĀ, AHICCHATRĀ, etc., were occupied. And the third would be that in which the degenerated PGW, overlapped by the NBPW, trickled e. ward up to n.-w. Bihar (VAIŚĀLĪ) and s. ward into Madhya Pradesh UJJAIN). In terms of ethnic history, it is tempting to associate these stages with the three stages of Aryan movement in India: the Rajasthan-Punjab-Haryana stage coinciding with the middle Vedic period of the 3rd and more particularly the last quarter of the 2nd millennium B.C.; the w. Uttar Pradesh stage corresponding to the late Vedic-cum-Brāhmaṇic period falling around 1000 B.C., and the degenerate n.-w. Bihar and Madhya Pradesh stage, being the one of Aryan diffusion e.wards and s.wards around the middle of the first millennium B.C. This correlation is no doubt tentative but does not lack plausibility.