Mobility and Subsistence Strategies: A Case Study of Inamgaon, A Chalcolithic Site in Western India
Date
1999
Authors
Contributor
Advisor
Department
Instructor
Depositor
Speaker
Researcher
Consultant
Interviewer
Narrator
Transcriber
Annotator
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
University of Hawai'i Press (Honolulu)
Volume
Number/Issue
Starting Page
Ending Page
Alternative Title
Abstract
This article concerns archaeological methodology and examines the categories archaeologists use to describe mobility and subsistence strategies of the past. The Chalcolithic Culture of Inamgaon (western India) is taken as a case study, first, to assess how earlier researchers have tried to understand subsistence and mobility change from past material culture and, second, to rethink the nature of the Chalcolithic in the Bhima Valley with special reference to the site of Inamgaon. Traditionally, it has been thought that a change occurred, from sedentary agriculture to that dominated by seminomadic sheep and goat pastoralism, in the later levels of this site because of environmental degradation and aridity. Given the nature of this droughtprone region, its land-use capability, the archaeological settlement pattern of the region, and the material remains of the site of Inamgaon, there is no evidence of a drastic change from a sedentary agriculturist to a seminomadic pastoralist lifestyle. It is suggested that semisedentary agropastoralism always existed in this area, along with small-scale mobility either by the whole population or a section of the population. Other nomadic groups with different subsistence strategies also existed in this region. The difference in material culture in the later levels of the site probably resulted from a change in the function of the site, from that of a habitation area to a short-term camping area frequented by mobile peoples, not from a cultural shift from sedentism to seminomadism. KEYWORDS: settlement pattern, subsistence, behavioral archaeology, India.
Description
Keywords
settlement pattern, subsistence, behavioral archaeology, India, Prehistoric peoples--Asia--Periodicals., Prehistoric peoples--Oceania--Periodicals., Asia--Antiquities--Periodicals., Oceania--Antiquities--Periodicals., East Asia--Antiquities--Periodicals.
Citation
Panja, S. 1999. Mobility and Subsistence Strategies: A Case Study of Inamgaon, A Chalcolithic Site in Western India. Asian Perspectives 38 (2): 154-85.
Extent
Format
Geographic Location
Time Period
Related To
Related To (URI)
Table of Contents
Rights
Rights Holder
Local Contexts
Email libraryada-l@lists.hawaii.edu if you need this content in ADA-compliant format.