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1. Kashmir Neolthic
Dr. Virag Sontakke
Assistant Professor
A.I.H.C. & Archaeology
Banaras Hindu University

2. Introduction
• The Neolithic settlements of North
India
• Important sites of the Kashmir
• Kanishpur (1998-99),
• Burzahom (1960-71) and
• Other Sites: Begagund, Gofkral,
Hariparigom, Olchibag, Pampur,
Panzgom, Sombur Waztal, and Brah,
etc.
• Revealed habitations of regular nature.

3. Geophysical Features
• The geology of Kashmir is part of the Himalayan formations
• It is similar to the areas to its west and east.
• Broadly based on physiographical features, as per Wadia, the state may
be divided into various sub-regions like the;
(i) Outer Ranges or the Sub-Himalaya or Siwalik Ranges,
(ii) The Middle Ranges or Lesser or Middle Himalayas -Panjal and
Dhauladhar Ranges,
(iii) Inner Himalayas,
(iv) Valleys,
(v) Lakes and
(vi) Glaciers.

4. Burzahom
• Burzahom is situated 11 km northeast of the capital city of Srinagar.
• On a high terrace, which is part of the floodplain of the Jhelum River
and has karewa formation.
• Elevation 1800 meter from MSL
• It is regarded as the northernmost excavated Neolithic site in the
country.
• The entire Kashmir Valley is a cup-shaped flat surrounded by the Pir
Panjal mountain range with tall birch trees
• The word ‘Burzahom’ literally means ‘birch’ a tree species generally
grow in the Himalayas.

7. Excavation and stratigraphy
• The site was excavated for ten years from 1960 to
1971
• Excavator: T.N. Khazanchi of ASI.
• Four periods of continuous occupation,
• Period I: Pre-Pottery Neolithic (devoid of any
pottery)
• Period II: Pottery Neolithic,
• Period III: Megalithic age
• Period IV: Early Historic

10. Period I
• Remains at the lower levels
• People living inside the dwelling pit
• They cut the natural soil and make a pit
• Pit was narrow at mouth and broad at the base
• Shape: Circular or oval
• Dug in natural deposit/soil (Karewa soil formation)
• The cuts-marks suggested that they dug out with long stone celts
• Post holes (Wooden) on the ground level suggesting a birch cover as a
protection

11. Period I: Dwelling pits
• A few pits had steps and ladder
• Ash and charcoal found at the base
• Stone hearths have also been found at ground levels,
• Near the mouth of pits, and at the base showing that habitation
activities.
• Particularly characterized by dwelling pits, the largest measuring
• 2.74 m at the top (9ft)
• 4.75 m at the base and (15.6 ft)
• 3.95 m. at a depth (13 ft)
• Some pits were shallower, with depth of about 91 cm (as opposed to 3.95
meters depth) and were possibly either storage pits or those used as
dwellings during warmer period.

15. Period I
• Bones and stone tools like
• Bone tools: harpoons, needles with or without eyes, awls used
probably for stitching skins, spear-points, arrow-heads and
daggers
• Stone: axes, chisels, adzes, pounders, mace-heads, points and
picks
• Apart from stone, antlers were also used for tool-production.
• Period is marked by absence of any burial system as
• No remains of cultivation.

16. Bone Tools

17. Stone Tools

18. Neolithic Period II
• Use of pottery
• No use of dwelling pits
• Huts constructed over ground
• Evidence of Cultivation
• Development in tool technique and production
• Overall advance stage

19. Period II: Houses
• No use of pit for swellings
• Use of mud/ mud brick structures

20. Period II: Pottery
• Black ware,
• Red ware
• Dish with Stand
• Globular pot
• Perforated jars
• Funnel shaped vase

21. Period II: Tools
• Stone and Bone
• Show development in finishing
• Rectangular harvester
• Bone point, awl

22. Antiquities
Stone
• stone axe,
• chisel,
• adze,
• hoe,
• point,
• wedge,
• celt,
• mace head,
• knife,
• pestle,
• quern,
• harvester, etc.;
Bone
• needle,
• harpoon,
• point,
• arrow,
• spear, etc.
• The presence of bone
harpoons clearly indicate the
exploitation of fish from the
lakes located nearby

23. Period II: Other
Antiquities
• Copper Arrowhead
• Redware pot with 950 beads (Agate,
carnelian etc.)
• A stone slab with a hunting scene
• The pot depicts horned motifs, which
suggests extra territorial links with sites
like Kot-Diji, in Sindh, dated 2700 BCE.

24. Period II: Burials
• Burzahom is also known for the evidence of disposal of dead.
• Humans buried in oval pits
• Pits were mostly dug into the house floors or in the compounds
• Inner side of the pits plastered with lime.
• The pits of varying diameters ranging from 1 m to 2 m are generally narrower
towards the top.
• The bodies were buried with pots, tools and other objects of day-to-day life,
• This whole indicating the belief in life after death.
• At times animal were buried with the dead as pets, perhaps as part of ritual.
• The Palaeobotanical remains indicate that wheat, barley and lentil were among the
staple food along with meat and fish.
• The burial practices and type of tools recovered from the site were inferred as having
a close resemblance to those found in the North Chinese Neolithic culture

25. Burials
Sr.
N0.
Skeleton
Number
Azimuth/
Orientation
POSITION DEPTH SEX GRAVE GOODS
1 SKL. 1 WE Crouched 5’-7’11” Earthen goblets
2 SKL 2 WE Foetal Child
3 SKL 3 NW-SE Crouched 5’10’’ 5’6’’ Skull of a dog
4 SKL 4 EW 5’10’’ 5’6’’ Red ochre
5 SKL 5 SE-NW 6’ 3’9’’ 7’4’’ Red ochre, earthen pot, small
barrel shaped paste bead
6 SKL 6 NS 6’ 3’9’’ 7’4’’ Male Animal bones
7 SKL 7 NE-SW Crouched 6’ 3’9’’ 7’4’’ Female Red ochre, animal bones, antler,
horn pieces, soap stone circular
disc
8 SKL 8 NE 10’4’’
10’7’
CARNELIAN BEADS
9 SKL 9 10’4’’
10’7’
10 SKL 10 NW-SE 10’4’’
10’7’
Circular stone bowl

26. Burials
• Burials found mostly within the settlement.
• The burials showed both primary and secondary in nature
• The ochre on the bones is a special feature here in human burials.
• Four of the human skeletons found were buried in a crouching position.
• Sometimes, no grave furniture was noticed.
• Animals were buried along humans.
• Dog, wolf and ibex were mostly buried.
• In one grave skeletal remains of five wild dogs and deer horn found.
• It appears that pet animals like dogs, were sacrificed and buried along
with the human body.

29. Trepanned Skull
• It belonged to a woman, aged at 26-30 years,
• Its cranial capacity was of 1353 cc.
• Woomen was suffering from some mysterious ailment/epilepsy/insanity,
• Presumably due to a brain tumour apparent from the left-sided cranial
hypertrophy.
• Sick woman needed prolonged life- saving spiritual and ultimately
surgical intervention
• The skull presents six small but completed holes and 5 tiny shallow
depressions as well.
• Roy Chowdhury (1973): Trepanations were done upon a living person for
a medical purpose.
• Basu & Pal (1980): It was a posthumous intervention for the sole purpose
of taking out bone roundels to be worn as amulets.

30. • Ankhyan & Weber (2001) and Sankhyan (2008): They
assumed it a surgical intervention and classifying the 11
attempts made in three major stages at different times.
• He re-classified the 11 perforations into: depressions (1-5)
and trepanned holes (6-11.
• Holes are almost of the same size and outline and were
made very neatly and carefully by the same instrument.
• Holes (10 & 11), are bigger in size and uneven in shape,
were most likely a post-mortem study
• It is therefore possible that the antler piece or animal
bones could have been used as drills of various diameters
for trepanation.
• She had to bear the torture of so many strokes on her vault
for trepanations, obviously for treatment and not for bone
roundels as argued by Basu & Pal (1980).
• But, every likely she could not survive the 9th operation
Trepanned Skull

31. Period II: Burials
• Ovel pits dug inside the house
floors
• Floors were plastered with lime
• Body were placed with red-
ochre
• Skeleton were found in
crouched position
• Five wild dog and antlers horn
found in single grave
Anthropological study:
a.People has a long-head
b.Tall and homogeneous
population,
c.More related to the mature
Harappan in the Cemetery
R37 than to other
contemporary Neolithic
populations elsewhere in India.
d.Possibly closer to the today’s
Punjabi people in Northwest
India.

32. Neolithic Art
• An engraved stone slab found, fixed in a rectangular
structure forming some sort of a tank.
• Datable to period II
• The engraved face was placed upside down, making it
non-functional in the place in which it has been found.
• The stone slab (base width 70 cm.)
• Towards the top it is partially damaged,
• Its a hunting scene showing an deer being pierced from
behind with a long spear by a hunter and an arrow
being discharged by another hunter from the front .
• The topmost portion shows two suns and a dog.
• Showing two suns may probably have some symbolic
value and perhaps may indicate hunting in daylight.
• If the presumption is correct then one sun may be
depicting the rising sun and another the setting sun.
Another stone slab showing an incomplete pattern has
also been found from the same structure.

33. Observation
• C14 dates: 2357 BC-2700 BCE (Period I)
• Gradual development
• Residence: Dwelling pit
• Stone and bone tools
• Medical advancement
• Connection with Harappans
• Birch tree wood was found in the excavations.
• The interaction of local and foreign influences
• Some graffiti marks on pottery and others.

34. Chronology
• Some of the select list of radiocarbon dates from the Neolithic levels of
Burzahom
• Dates based on half-life value of 5730 years.
TF-15 1530 + 110 B.C.
TF-129 1825 + 110 B.C.
TF-13 1850 + 125 B.C.
TF-14 2025 + 350 B.C.
TF-127 2100 + 115 B.C.
TF-123 2225 + 115 B.C.
TF-128 2375 + 120 B.C.

35. Gufkral

36. Gufkral
• The site is situated 41 km of Srinagar.
• It is located on an upper karewa
• The mound measures 400 m long north-south and 75 m wide
east-west.
• Gufkral (Literally guf-cave, kral-potter)
• Site inhabited by potters who utilize the caves cut into the
karewa
• The site was excavated by the Prehistory Branch of the
Archaeological Survey of India in 1981.

39. Cultural Sequence
• The site was explored in 1962-1963 by Archaeological Survey of India.
• A maximum of 3.10 m of habitation deposit was encountered
• Period I: Neolithic
• Period IA : Aceramic Neolithic
• Period IB : Early Neolithic
• Period IC : Late Neolithic
• Period II : Megalithic
• Period III : Historical

40. Period IA: Aceramic Neolithic
• Deposit of 35 cm to 1.10 m
• Large and small dwelling pits cut into the top of natural soil/deposits
• Circular or oval in plan
• Narrow mouths and wide bottoms
• Varied in diameter from 3.80 m to 1.50 m at the top
• These pits were surrounded by storage pits and hearths.
• A number of postholes found around the pits and the hearths.
• The bases of the superstructures were plaster with mud to give them strength
and to prevent entry of water and snow from the sides
• Dwelling pits were plastered with red ochre paste
• Animals hunted were roasted by hanging them over the fire in the hearth
supported by the poles.
• Roasting of food (both flesh and grains) was done only outside as no hearths or
fireplaces were found inside the dwelling pits.
• People used to live outside during warm seasons and occupied dwelling pits in
winter

41. Period IA: Tools
• Polished stone celts, both finished and unfinished,
• Stone points, with one and both ends sharp, made of Himalayan Trap;
also,
• One broken unfinished ring stone
• Pounders and querns (red Ochre paste)
• Bone Tools (27): Polished
• Made of Long bones, horns and splinters of cattle, sheep, goat, ibex etc.
• Shape: Arrowhead, points, awls, piercers, scrapers

43. Ornaments
• Cylindrical bone bead (highly polished
• Two steatite beads

44. Animal remains
Wild
• Red deer
• Wolf
• Ibex
• Bear
Domesticated
• Sheep
• Goat
• Cattle

45. Agricultural Remains
• Barley
• Wheat
• Lentil (Masoor)
• Weedy plants

46. Period IB: Early Neolithic
• Without any gap
• 40 cm thick deposit
• First-time appearance of pottery
• Handmade, dull red and grey ware, coarse red ware
• Shape: bowls, basins, dish-on-stand, big jars
• Decoration: pinched design on the neck, reed impressions

47. Settlement pattern
• No dwelling pits
• Wall made houses
• Evidence of mud and rubble walls
• Lime floors (5-7 cm ) thick

48. Tools
• Bone and stone tools
• Stone points
• Stone ring-stones
• Bone points
• Bone piercers
• Bone scrapers
• Bone spatula

49. Food habits of period 1B: Early Neolithic
Animal remains
• More bones of domesticated
animals
• Sheep,
• Goat
• Cattle
• Dog bones (+)
• Wolf bones (-)
• Deer
• Ibex
• Bear
Agricultural remains
• Barley
• Wheat
• Lentil (Masoor)
• Common Pea

52. Period IC: Mature Neolithic
• 80 cm deposit
• Pottery: Grey ware, Burnished grey ware, black burnished ware,
red gritty ware
• Shapes: Shapes of period IB continues
• Long neck jars
• Cord decoration on pottery
• Graffiti was also found

53. Tools of Period IC: Mature Neolithic
• Fewer objects
• One unfinished stone celts
• Stone points
• Querns, Pounders and balls
• Double-holed-harvesters
• 41 bone tools: Arrowhead, Awls, bone points (mostly polished)

54. Other items
• Stone engraver (to remove extra soil on the pots)
• Terracotta Bangles
• Copper hairpin (upper level indicating foreign contact)
• Spindle whorls (for woolen garments)

55. Food Habits
Grains
• Barley
• Wheat
• Lentil (Masoor)
• Common Pea
Animal bones
• Sheep
• Goats
• Cattle
• Dogs
• Pig
• Fish

57. Gufkral: Observations
• Period IA
• Early beginning of
the site before pottery
(Aceramic period)
• Initially started living
in dwelling pits due
to the cold
environment
• Used stone tools
along with bone tools
• Initially Hunted wild
animals and
domesticated cattle
and sheep
• Grown wheat and
barley
• Period IB
• Soon folks moved to
the compact walled
huts
• Used pottery
• Well-polished bone
tools
• Period IC
• Mature stage
• More pottery
• Stable houses
• Well-polished bone
tools
• Full-fledged
agriculture
• Evidence of
ornaments, toys and

58. Conclusion
• Sites show the history of Kashmir,
• From subterranean dwelling pits, the evidence in the site shows the emergence of mud-
structures
• The transition from underground pits pattern to compact houses
• The transition from Aceramic to ceramic
• Handmade to wheel made pottery
• Stone and bone tools: hunting and farming
• Cultural contacts with Central Asia
• Association with Gangetic Plain and adjacent area
• Burzahom demonstrated the transformation of human settlements (from pit
dwellings to dwellings of mud walls above the ground).
• Burzahom demonstrates the links with the contemporary Harappan
settlements in the form of ceramics and elaborate carnelian beads.
• Gufkral is also shown the gradual development.