An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology v2.c40.59

v2.c40.59

There were at least five Neolithic sites—Sites 45, 46, 46 A, 47 and 68—the last-mentioned being a cemetery with two strata of burials. All these sites, except Site 68, were situated along the foot of a doleritic dyke that traversed along the centre of the valley. Site 45, representing the earliest Neolithic phase (earlier than 2500 B C ), revealed a short-blade microlithic industry accompanied by a crude reddish-brown handmade pottery, basaltic or quartzite flakes and a few crudely fashioned neoliths probably used for tillage operation. It did not yield burnished grey ware, disc beads and animal bones which became the dominant features in the evolved Neolithic phase of Nagarjunakonda. Phase II of the Neolithic culture, which did not evolve out of the earlier one, was characterized by the higher frequency of red ware over the burnished grey ware, besides the occurrence of pits, animal bones. microliths on chert and rock crystal, flake tools on greyish quartzite and disc beads. The occupants seem to have lived in some sort of semisubterranean dwellings, and one such pit contained the skeleton of an adult male, tall and robust and having a dolichocephalic head. It was covered by a cairn heap; in fact all the pits in the same alignment were packed with boulders. This was the period when Neolithic tools were used quite commonly. The earlier stratum of Site 68, yielding only extended inhumation burial, was perhaps coeval with this phase.