Characterising Material Culture to Determine Settlement Patterns in North West Kashmir

This thesis explores the cultural profile of Baramulla District by determining settlement patterns through systematic field survey and artefact analysis. Until this new study, very little archaeological work had been carried out in Kashmir, and what had been done took the form of a few unsystematic explorations and site specific excavations; in Baramulla District the situation was even more extreme. The limited archaeological work carried out in Baramulla District showed that there was great potential for further work, and there also appeared to be no evidence for an Iron Age activity in this region. Baramulla has a distinct place in Kashmir; its location on the network of trade routes connects it to the Indian plains towards the south, and the northern areas of South and Central Asia towards the north. To understand the archaeology of Baramulla District, a systematic transect based landscape survey was undertaken. The material culture recovered from the newly located and recorded sites was evaluated and carefully analysed to arrive at new interpretations about past settlement and activity, and this information was synthesised with previously available from key sites in Kashmir and South Asia. The new data thus available showed that human presence in the region begins during the Upper Palaeolithic period (c. 18000 BP) and continues up to later historic period (c. 10th century AD). This thesis therefore examines the material culture and settlement data of four chronological periods: the Upper Palaeolithic period, the Neolithic period, the early historic period and the later historic periods in Baramulla District. This data is analysed to explore different issues: site types; settlement data; issues of continuity or discontinuity in chronology and interactions with South and Central Asia on the basis of similarities and dissimilarities in material culture, and the apparent ‘missing’ Iron Age.