Metal and hindu civilization

[Guest guest]

John Marshall noted in his Mohenjodaro report that much of the gold

found there was of light colour. This indicated a high silver

content, making it unrefined electrum. Such electrum could not have

been obtained from panning on river beds but from the quartz reefs

of Karnataka.

 

Allchin makes a perceptive observation that many neolithic

settlements cluster around Hatti gold bands in Karnataka and that

many places where early Buddha inscriptions are found are close to

gold sources. Silver also was extensive in the civilization because

a large number of vessels were found to be made of silver. A good

example is a silver buckle of Harappa using gold wire, gold-capped

beads, boss of silver inlaid with, guess what, conch-shell!

 

This riverine, maritime civilization had gone beyond the neolithic

state and entered the cvilization phase of working with metals,

creating alloys mixing minerals.

 

Many neolithic settlements and many buddha/jaina archaeological

sites are close to mining areas and metal-working centres. Recently,

a site was found in Tunnur of Gulbarga district, not far from the

pilgrimage town of Sannati. The sculptures in stone are indicative

of metal tools used for creating them.

 

Gulbarga and Bijapur are renowned for the forge-welded copper-tin-

iron canons, breath-taking in splendour, unparalleled in the history

of metallurgy.

 

It is this metals tradition which can help unravel the roots of

hindu civilization.

 

Take the word 'ayas' in the R.gveda. Many linguists have propounded

many theories. So, the subject can do with some more theorising.

 

aduru is a word in Kannada which means 'unsmelted iron or native

metal'. Cognates are: ayiri (Tamil); ajirda karba (Tulu). Why can't

this be the substrate or adstrate or borrowing which explains 'ayas'

of R.gveda? Let the linguistic pundits argue about this and come to

some consensus.

 

Use of metal is a hall-mark of a civilization and Sarasvati

civilization provides many examples of metal artefacts. The recent

discoveries in Ganga basin about iron-smelting dated to circa 1800

BCE forces us to question the terminology of 'chalcolithic' period

used for Sarasvati civilization (circa 3300 BCE, Harappa to 1500

BCE, Dwaraka). It appears that the period was a 'metals, alloying'

phase, working with alloys of tin, zinc, arsenic and, of course,

copper.

 

I would suggest that the roos of hindu civilization have to be found

on the sites of Hatti gold band, on the sites of Nahali-speakers,

not far from Omkares'war on the banks of Rivers Narmada and Kaveri,

not far from the Bhimbetka caves.

 

Let the linguists also arrive at a consensus on Nahali; is it ia,

munda or dravidian or a language isolate? It sure has produced a

word which has spread to Assam: kola. The word means 'woman'. Also

means 'furnace'.

 

How come that the land that Buddha and Mahavira walked and the land

where their teachings spread are not far from the minining and metal-

working areas of ancient times? Shouldn't this 'coincidence' make us

pause and enquire further on the roots of bharatiya languages which

seem to have benefited from one another with intense interactions in

the fields of agrarian, va_stu and metals technologies, governed by

the doctrine of vrata? Isn't it remarkable that a vra_tya means a

soldier and that the metal products led to the great war called the

Mahabharata war which took place on the banks of River Sarasvati?

 

The chronology of hindu civilization may unravel as the sequencing

of metallurgical tradition unravels, culminating in the magnificent

monument called the Delhi iron pillar.

http://www.iitk.ac.in/infocell/Archive/dirnov1/iron_pillar.html

 

Kalyanaraman

 

Buddhist site found in Gulbarga district

 

Gulbarga, Aug 13 - A research team of the Kannada Research Institute

of Karnatak University has discovered what could be a 2,000-year-old

Buddhist site at Tunnur in Chitapur taluk of Gulbarga district.

 

The team consisting of the director of the institute, R M

Shadaksharaiah, and the research scholar Jayashree Baburao Deshmanya

made the discovery during the course of their research on Buddhist

remains in the district.

 

A few kilometres away from Tunnur village, archaeologists had found

a Buddhist site near the pilgrimage town of Sannati more than a

decade ago. Later, the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) declared

it a protected national monument and took up excavation and

reconstruction work.

 

During the excavation, archaeologists recovered priceless artefacts

and terracotta items revealing the influence of Buddhism in the

region. According to Dr. Shadaksharaiah, the research team found

artefacts dating back to many centuries and most of the sculptural

panels found were scattered in a radius of about 1 km.

 

Some of the panels recovered included one depicting Mandoka Jataka

story, Dharmachakra, a piece of stupa fence, and two types of

memorial stones. In the Mandoka Jataka story panel the figures of a

queen, Amatya, pattada horse, and pattada elephant are clearly

visible, and the panel is quite similar to the one recovered from

Hampi in Bellary district.

 

Research scholars during the course of their work found two distinct

memorials. One of them belonged to the king and the royal members

and another to the common people. In the former, there are figures

of a horse, servants of the royal family, and king and queen seated

and holding goblets.

 

Some of the memorials bear labels with inscriptions in Brahmi script

and Prakrit language. One of them reads: "Valavasa Papalana

Kanhasa." Kanhasa means Krishna.

 

The panels are made on limestone.

 

http://www.sunnetwork.org/news/regional/karnataka/karnataka.asp?

id=10001