STONES IN THE GANGA PLAINS: HOLOCENE SETTLEMENT, LITHIC NETWORKS, AND LANDSCAPE GEOMORPHOLOGY

Holocene landscape evolution in the mid-Gangetic plains, northern India, was shaped by a complex succession of fluvial deposition in the context of drainage reorganization influenced by neotectonic activity and climate shifts. A debate currently splits the field on the intelligibility and our ability to model these processes over the large region (e.g., Srivastava et al 2003 and Sinha and Gibling date). This paper presents the results of an archaeological survey conducted in a study region of one of the plain's major trunk rivers, the Yamuna. The study region is concentrated upon the 200 Ha site of Kausambi, which became one of South Asia's largest metropolises in the early centuries CE. In its hinterland a complex of smaller sites document changing settlement patterns from the mid-Holocene onwards. This paper provides a summary of the various lithic materials which inhabitants within this zone, which has no lithic resources save one residual sandstone outcrop, produced and used. In doing so, this paper attempts to synthesize accumulating evidence from the fields of quaternary science and archaeology about the landscape of the peripheral margin of the Ganga foreland basin.