Iron in Ancient India c6.s1.1

c6.s1.1

A very remarkable and large number of prehistoric iron implements such as swords, daggers, tridents, spears, javelins, arrows, spades, hangers, saucer lamps, beam rods and tripods has been unearthed during the excavation of numerous burial sites in the gravelly mounds of the Tinnevelly district of the Madras Presidency, adjoining the valley of the Tāmraparni river.¹ The age of these burial sites cannot be ascertained with anything approaching approximation as the burial urns must have been sunk inside the earth in an age when the custom of cremation was not introduced into Southern India. The Pandiyan Kingdom existed from a very early time, and is referred to in an Asoka inscription 250 B.C. in Northern India.² The Pandyas were also known to the Sanskrit grammarian Kātyāyana whose date probably is not later than the fourth century B.C. Earlier and later writers mention them. In the Rāmāyana and Mahābhārat, the Pandiyans, Dravidas and Cholas are mentioned. The Pandiyans were in possession of the Tinnevelly district from the earliest historical times.³ The original line of kings seems to have continued down to their conquest by Rajendra Chola in A.D. 1064. It would be hazardous to guess if urn burial was prevalent during the reign of the earliest Pandiyan kings, the custom of burial being supplanted by cremation later on.