Iron Age India

The Iron Age in the Indian subcontinent succeeds the Late Harappan (Cemetery H) culture, also known as the last phase of the Indus Valley Tradition.

There has been fresh evidence for even earlier iron-working in India. 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”. [ The origins of Iron-working in India:New evidence from the Central Ganga Plain and the Eastern Vindhyas ,By Rakesh Tewari - Director, U.P. State Archaeological Department, India http://www.archaeologyonline.net/artifacts/iron-ore.html ]

The earliest Iron Age site in South India is Hallur, Karnataka at around 1000 BC.

References

*Kenoyer, J.M. 1998 Ancient Cities of the Indus Valley Civilization. Oxford University Press and American Institute of Pakistan Studies, Karachi.
*Kenoyer, J. M. 1991a The Indus Valley Tradition of Pakistan and Western India. In Journal of World Prehistory 5(4): 331-385.
*Kenoyer, J. M. 1995a Interaction Systems, Specialized Crafts and Culture Change: The Indus Valley Tradition and the Indo-Gangetic Tradition in South Asia. In The Indo-Aryans of Ancient South Asia: Language, Material Culture and Ethnicity, edited by G. Erdosy, pp. 213-257. Berlin, W. DeGruyter.
*Shaffer, J. G. 1992 The Indus Valley, Baluchistan and Helmand Traditions: Neolithic Through Bronze Age. In Chronologies in Old Worlsfgagd Archaeology (3rd Edition), edited by R. Ehrich, pp. 441-464. Chicago, University of Chicago Press.
*CHAKRABARTI, D.K. 1974. Beginning of Iron in India: Problem Reconsidered, in A.K. Ghosh (ed.), Perspectives in Palaeoanthropology: 345-356. Calcutta: Firma K.L. Mukhopadhyay. –1976. The beginning of iron in India. Antiquity 4: 114-124. –1992. The Early Use of Iron in India. Delhi: Oxford University Press. –1999. India An Archaeological History. Delhi: Oxford University Press

Notes

ee also

*Kingdoms of ancient India
*Mahajanapadas
*Maurya Empire
*Iron Age China