Showing posts with label IRON IN INDIA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label IRON IN INDIA. Show all posts

Monday, September 29, 2014

INDIA WAS PIONEER OF IRON WORK BEFORE STOLEN BY WEST

Recent excavations in Uttar Pradesh have turned up iron artefacts, furnaces, tuyeres and slag in layers radiocarbon dated between c. BCE 1800 and 1000. This raises again the question of whether iron working was brought in to India during supposed immigrations of the second millennium BCE, or developed independently.
This is per Article and Research by By Rakesh Tewari
[Director, U.P. State Archaeological Department, Roshan-ud-daula Kothi,
Kaisarbagh, Lucknow 226 001 (U.P.) India (Email: rakeshlko@rediffmail.com )
 

Technical studies on materials dated c. 1000 BCE at Komaranhalli (Karnataka) showed that the smiths of this site could deal with large artefacts, implying that they had already been experimenting for centuries (Agrawal et al. 1985: 228-29). Sahi (1979: 366) drew attention to the presence of iron in Chalcolithic deposits at Ahar, and suggested that “the date of the beginning of iron smelting in India may well be placed as early as the sixteenth century BCE” and “by about the early decade of thirteenth century BCE iron smelting was definitely known in India on a bigger scale”. On the basis of four radiocarbon measurements, ranging between 3790 + 110 BP and 3570 + 100 BP, available for the Megalithic period (without iron) Sharma (1992: 64, 67) has proposed a range of 1550-1300 BCE (uncalibrated) for the subsequent iron bearing period at Gufkral (Jammu & Kashmir).
On the basis of this evidence a date of around 1300/1200 BCE has been suggested for the beginning of iron in India and c. 800 BCE for the mid Ganga Valley (Allchin & Allchin 1982: 345; Prakash & Tripathi 1986: 568; Gaur 1997: 240). Chakrabarti (1992: 68, 164; 1999: 333) has observed that at Ahar it would be the first quarter of the second millennium BCE and in Malwa soon after the middle of the second millennium BCE. However, the early dates for iron at Ahar are refuted on the grounds of uncertain stratigraphy (Gaur 1997: 244). As far as Komaranhalli is concerned, it is stated that the TL dates have large errors and hence uncertain (Agrawala 2000: 197, 200).
table
Dates* for early iron-use from Indian sites


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