<< Our Photo Pages >> Thiruporur Stone Circles and Burial Cists - Stone Circle in India
Submitted by Ashvin on Sunday, 10 October 2010 Page Views: 27325
Site WatchSite Name: Thiruporur Stone Circles and Burial CistsCountry: India
NOTE: This site is 35.746 km away from the location you searched for.
Type: Stone Circle
Nearest Town: Thiruporur
Latitude: 12.686093N Longitude: 80.152141E
Condition:
5 | Perfect |
4 | Almost Perfect |
3 | Reasonable but with some damage |
2 | Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site |
1 | Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks |
0 | No data. |
-1 | Completely destroyed |
5 | Superb |
4 | Good |
3 | Ordinary |
2 | Not Good |
1 | Awful |
0 | No data. |
5 | Can be driven to, probably with disabled access |
4 | Short walk on a footpath |
3 | Requiring a bit more of a walk |
2 | A long walk |
1 | In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find |
0 | No data. |
5 | co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates |
4 | co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map |
3 | co-ordinates scaled from a bad map |
2 | co-ordinates of the nearest village |
1 | co-ordinates of the nearest town |
0 | no data |
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Stone Circles and Burial Cists in India. Ashvin Rajagopalan writes: On a hot Sunday afternoon in May, a few of us archaeology enthusiasts from Chennai (Tamilnadu, India) decided to follow up on a recent newspaper article and drove down to the small town of Thiruporur.
We read that there was a Megalithic burial site dating from 1000 – 300 BCE close to this town. The report said that this site was being encroached upon by local property developers, all this, in spite of there being a notice board and strict warnings saying that the land was protected by the Archaeological Survey of India. Our visit to Thiruporur was out of sheer curiosity that this site was so close to Chennai and none of us had even heard of its existence untill now.
Thiruporur is a tiny non-descript town at the end of the IT Corridor on the Old Mahabalipuram Road. The town literally lies in the shadow of the mega buildings that are fueling modern India’s growth. Thiruporur has a well documented Pallava history as well as a Chola history and most structures around the 16th century Murugan temple are just as old. This town however, has a lot more to offer than it’s made out to be. Surrounding Thiruporur on the road towards Thirukazhugkundram, is a large reserve shrub forest. Situated in this shrub forest is a lake on whose banks a 2500 year old civilization existed.
A small deviation from the Thirukazhugkundram / Chengalpet road, near the village of Sirudhavur, leads you over the lake mound and into the lake bed. What one is immediately struck by is a lush green patch of grass and in the middle, blue waters. There is a small, newly-laid tar road that oddly cut across the lake bed. We drove along this road and quite easily spotted two Stone Circles on the left side of the road. We parked our car nearby and went to examine the site. To our amazement we found that the two burial circles were quite large with about 20 large boulders forming the circle. A trench was dug along the side of the newly-laid road. After a close examination of the trench, we were surprised to find many small pottery fragments. There was no doubt in our minds that these pottery fragments were extremely old and belonged to the Megalithic site.
While we were looking at the circles and broken pottery and excitedly discussing our theories, a local man walked up to us and said that what we were looking at was not as significant as what lay on the other side of the road! He asked us to just cross the road to the other side where all the fences were and we could find hundreds of such circles! Immediately, we walked across the tiny road and to our amazement, saw traces of several stone circles within the many fenced off properties.
To our shock we at once realized that the land around the lake bed was being fenced off and sold. There were full fledged plotted properties with even access roads being made between them. Then it hit us. Every Stone Circle that stood in the path of this illegal property development was heading towards imminent destruction.
As we made our way to what was more like a megalithic war-zone than a burial site, we noticed that several stone circles had been removed and dumped along the properties to make fences or used as landfill. We asked our local guide who was now eagerly walking with us, very amused, if these were approved plots. He straight away, in a very cynical manner, told us that this is all illegal and that these people were speculating on future prices. He also went on to tell us that 3 cents of land is priced at about Rs.50,000/-. None of these fenced properties had a Patta, so the owners act very fast and remove the stone circles in their property and plant coconut trees or banana plantations. As we looked further ahead we saw industrial strength machines digging wells in several properties. All these properties, not long ago, had stone circles in them.
A Brief Lesson in History
At this point we would like to bring you up to speed on what a megalithic site is and why this particular site is important. The term “Megalithic” gets its name from the fact that the people of this culture built structures using large boulders, stones, rock slabs or menhirs. Megalithic sites in India are dated from 7000 BCE in North India, around the Ganges Valley, to 2500 BCE in South India, in Karnataka and 1000 BCE in Tamil Nadu. These cultures existed broadly between the Neolothic Period (end of the Stone Age) till the end of the Iron Age where domestication of animals and farming along with the technology to smelt iron existed. Till this day it is not known whether Megalithic sites in India were related to Megalithic sites in Europe or whether they were people of common origin or if they traded with each other and thus had a common culture.
South India, particularly Tamil Nadu, has had a long history of “Descent of Technology” where technology was slowly passed down to the people from cultures in the north of India over many thousands of years. This is why most Megalithic sites in Tamil Nadu are classified as being from 1000 – 300 BCE. The iron-age arrived in Tamil Nadu around 500 BCE whereas iron-age civilizations existed in the Ganges Valley as early as 2700 BCE.
Megalithic sites are known to exist all over Tamilnadu and especially around Coimbatore and Thirunelveli districts. There are several Megalithic sites around Chennai itself! Excavations have been conducted in the late 1800’s in Chetpet, Perambur, Pallavaram and Saidapet that revealed several hundred burial urns and some rare sarcophaguses. The ancient roman port of Arikamedu near Pondicherry is a later megalithic site that specialized in bead-making. Sites of Adichannalur along the Thamarabarani river and Kodumanal Megalithic sites have yielded several burial sites and many explorations have shed light on the megalithic people of those areas. However, nothing is known of the Thiruporur site. A brief excavation by the Archaeological Survay of India was conducted in 2008 - 09. Excavation reports are not available.
What we found at the Thiruporur burial site
We began walking along one of the roads that had been freshly created at the burial site. As we walked, we noticed two deep channels dug besides the road for drainage and noticed that they were filled with pottery shards. We immediately started looking at them and found that they were of two types. One was the thicker crude terracotta that was used to make large urns and sarcophaguses. The other type was what one calls Polished ware or Rouletted ware. This is especially important to establish the fact that this kind of pottery was indigenously created and not through technology learnt from roman trade as popularly believed. This Thiruporur site is not mentioned in any Roman or Sangam Age texts.
By now we had spotted about 10 intact stone circles and made our way through the maze of fence posts. We were quite horrified at the scale of which the stone circles were being removed. Hundreds of them were removed and used as fencing for the properties. One thing was common to all these properties, hundreds of broken pottery fragments were found all over. We asked a few locals who were watching us if they had found any pottery in their properties and they all strongly denied ever having come across anything like that. It was evident that they did not want to have anything to do with the possibility of having their land confiscated by the government. It is also unfair to blame them as they are struggling to survive and probably spent every penny of their savings to buy this land. It is the middlemen, property promoters and local governing bodies who are the real culprits.
As we walked further we could see much larger scale destruction. Complete stone circles were being bulldozed to make way for access roads. Throughout the freshly made roads, lay large pieces of broken pottery and sarcophaguses. The worst part of this was also that the mud and sand in the area was being quarried illegally and carried away to other construction sites. It was quite evident that with the sand and mud, hundreds of pottery pieces were being taken away and lost forever.
By now, as we saw stone circles being desecrated over and over again, we are heartbroken to see entire sarcophaguses lying exposed and damaged. There was even in one instance, a new property boundary marker that was driven right through a sarcophagus. It was scary to see that there were so many fresh tire marks of heavy vehicles used to quarry away the sand. All the large stones lay scattered. It probably won’t be too long before someone starts to carry away these stones themselves for their material value.
It is only through the objects found in these burial sites that we can build a comprehensive structure of the lives and culture of the people who were buried here. Such sites commonly supply archaeologists with so much information including the kind of crops that were grown, the tools that were used and the language that was spoken. It is common to find graffiti symbols on these pottery fragments that can help us better understand their script and help to decode information on these iron-age civilizations. With the burials being destroyed it will be virtually impossible to piece together what remains in each destroyed stone circle. The sad part is that most of this material is being carted away only to be landfill at some construction site.
Much to our amazement, while examining one of the trenches created along the new road, we found fragments of iron objects. These objects are like the holy grail of megalithic sites. They tell us a lot about the advancements in iron usage including their ability to process iron from ore to finished products. Nearby this trench were large remnants of what appeared to be a furnace. It is sad that due to this destruction it had become impossible to even work out the layout and sketch a possible map of their habitation.
In one of the trenches that were bulldozed we found small fragments of decorated pottery. Amongst the rubble we also found small iron fragments. These iron pieces prove that this particular site was aware of iron casting and used iron tools. This very discovery tells us that in the surrounding area there must be a furnace and crucible where iron was being processed. It also meant that the area around this megalithic site contained iron ore deposits.
Surprisingly, after our examination of the site, we didn’t even find a trace of any ASI board. What we did see was that electricity was being supplied to all plots that were sold and that this would mean rapid construction in the area.
Catch 22
Indian antiquities laws are quite iron clad about individuals excavating at archaeological sites. It is illegal for individuals to excavate any archaeological site and punishable by law including imprisonment and large fines. The Archaeological Survey of India on the other hand, does not have the manpower or resources to protect such sites from blatant encroachment. Fearing this we did not remove any items from the site. We photographed them the best we could and hoped that no one would cause further damage to them. However, every day the locals are buying and selling this land, promoters are making rich profits and getting away Scot-free. All one can do is sit and watch this destruction. Can one even imagine the Taj Mahal being destroyed brick by brick? Then how can we allow this to happen right here at our very backyard? The Indian Antiquities Act needs to provide some provisions that allow responsible citizens to take action against such destruction of our cultural heritage.
What can you do to help?
In this day and age of instant technology, it is easy to spread this awareness far and wide. We urge people to email this to your friends, add this to your blogs or even link this to your social networking profile. Every small step will help save our cultural heritage; something that is rightfully ours to protect.
Article by Ashvin Rajagopalan, Amateur Archaeologist.
Photo Credits: Raman Sankaran & Ashvin Rajagopalan
Note: Encroachments eat into megalithic sites in Chennai
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