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It is a long, tiring journey to Kodumanal, a tiny village in western Tamil Nadu -- a place virtually unheard of until archaeologists recently unearthed a 2,500-year-old industrial estate there.
The trip from Chennai to this inland village happens in three stages: eight-hour bus ride to Erode (district headquarters), two-hour bus ride to Kangeyam (small town in the textile district of Tirupur), final bus ride to Kodumanal.
The last leg is the most interesting. At first the rickety bus passes farmland and pretty bungalows, but then the surroundings grow barren.
There is only the occasional coconut tree. It is hard to believe that this area once held a thriving town. Modern Kodumanal has just around 1,000 people to make a living they breed cattle and work in the nearby textile town of Tirupur.
The chatty bus conductor asks, 'Sir, are you from the archaeological department?' When I shake my head, he says, 'So many people from the archaeological department come here these days that I assumed you were one of them.'
At the archaeological site near Kodumanal, even at 8 am the sun is merciless. Approaching the arid excavation area, one hears the sounds of digging, and of instructions being yelled to the scores of archaeology students busy on the site.
K Rajan, professor and head of the Department of History at Pondicherry University, leads the team. Rajan is in his early 50s. He stands in the heat talking to the students gathered around. Today is the last day of this dig at Kodumanal.
Kodumanal, Rajan explains, was a manufacturing and trading centre in the 4th century BCE. It is mentioned as such in the Sangam literature of classical Tamil (circa 300 BCE-300 CE). The settlement, which would have accommodated several thousand people in its heyday, appears to have been abandoned after the 3rd century CE.
Archaeologists arrived in Kodumanal in 1961, when V N Srinivasa Desikan of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) led the first dig. In 1980 a second, trial excavation was carried out by the Tamil Nadu State Archaeology Department.
More digs were executed in 1985, 1986, 1989 and 1990 by the Departments of Epigraphy and Archaeology of Tamil University, with the Department of Ancient History and Archaeology of Madras University, and the State Archaeology Department.
However, not much was found. Between 1985 and 1990 the archaeologists laid 49 trenches but collected only 170 inscribed potsherds (pottery fragments).
In 2012 the pattern has broken, and Rajan's team has struck gold. Between April 21 and this week, they laid four trenches and collected as many as 130 inscribed potsherds. Yathees Kumar V P, 32, a PhD student of archaeology from Pondicherry University, has worked at Kodumanal for two months.
'I have worked in four different sites since 2005,' he says. 'In those areas, finding one script itself is a big thing, here in one site we found 130.'
Kumar and another student have found two large pots, one of which bears a Tamil-Brahmi inscription in tall letters reading 'Samban Sumanan' -- a name. The pot is 4 ft tall, says Kumar, and was used to store water. Nearly all the newly unearthed inscriptions, in fact, are personal names; a few also refer to the trade performed by the named individual.
The words on the pots are in Prakrit, a north Indian language of the time. This tells us, says Rajan, that Kodumanal had cultural and trade contacts with the north.
Hard, slow work led up to these exciting discoveries. Rajan has been involved in excavating this site since 1984. The last excavation was in 1990. For this year's dig, the professor managed to raise Rs 3.5 lakh from the ASI and the Central Institute of Classical Tamil.
From the trenches have emerged fascinating and beautiful artefacts. Among the more decorative items are semi-finished bangles and bracelets made from beryl, a crystalline mineral. Some of these stones are so pure that they are colourless. One find is a tiger-shaped object made of copper, about 15 cm long (see image above).
It was studded with carnelians, sapphires and diamonds. Old quartz stones and broken beads -- of sapphire, beryl, agate, carnelian, amethyst, lapis lazuli, jasper, garnet, soapstone and quartz -- are strewn across the village.
m.rediff.com/business/slide-show/slide-show-1-big-discovery-a-2500-year-old-industrial-estate/20120612.htm#8
The trip from Chennai to this inland village happens in three stages: eight-hour bus ride to Erode (district headquarters), two-hour bus ride to Kangeyam (small town in the textile district of Tirupur), final bus ride to Kodumanal.
The last leg is the most interesting. At first the rickety bus passes farmland and pretty bungalows, but then the surroundings grow barren.
There is only the occasional coconut tree. It is hard to believe that this area once held a thriving town. Modern Kodumanal has just around 1,000 people to make a living they breed cattle and work in the nearby textile town of Tirupur.
The chatty bus conductor asks, 'Sir, are you from the archaeological department?' When I shake my head, he says, 'So many people from the archaeological department come here these days that I assumed you were one of them.'
At the archaeological site near Kodumanal, even at 8 am the sun is merciless. Approaching the arid excavation area, one hears the sounds of digging, and of instructions being yelled to the scores of archaeology students busy on the site.
K Rajan, professor and head of the Department of History at Pondicherry University, leads the team. Rajan is in his early 50s. He stands in the heat talking to the students gathered around. Today is the last day of this dig at Kodumanal.
Kodumanal, Rajan explains, was a manufacturing and trading centre in the 4th century BCE. It is mentioned as such in the Sangam literature of classical Tamil (circa 300 BCE-300 CE). The settlement, which would have accommodated several thousand people in its heyday, appears to have been abandoned after the 3rd century CE.
Archaeologists arrived in Kodumanal in 1961, when V N Srinivasa Desikan of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) led the first dig. In 1980 a second, trial excavation was carried out by the Tamil Nadu State Archaeology Department.
More digs were executed in 1985, 1986, 1989 and 1990 by the Departments of Epigraphy and Archaeology of Tamil University, with the Department of Ancient History and Archaeology of Madras University, and the State Archaeology Department.
However, not much was found. Between 1985 and 1990 the archaeologists laid 49 trenches but collected only 170 inscribed potsherds (pottery fragments).
In 2012 the pattern has broken, and Rajan's team has struck gold. Between April 21 and this week, they laid four trenches and collected as many as 130 inscribed potsherds. Yathees Kumar V P, 32, a PhD student of archaeology from Pondicherry University, has worked at Kodumanal for two months.
'I have worked in four different sites since 2005,' he says. 'In those areas, finding one script itself is a big thing, here in one site we found 130.'
Kumar and another student have found two large pots, one of which bears a Tamil-Brahmi inscription in tall letters reading 'Samban Sumanan' -- a name. The pot is 4 ft tall, says Kumar, and was used to store water. Nearly all the newly unearthed inscriptions, in fact, are personal names; a few also refer to the trade performed by the named individual.
The words on the pots are in Prakrit, a north Indian language of the time. This tells us, says Rajan, that Kodumanal had cultural and trade contacts with the north.
Hard, slow work led up to these exciting discoveries. Rajan has been involved in excavating this site since 1984. The last excavation was in 1990. For this year's dig, the professor managed to raise Rs 3.5 lakh from the ASI and the Central Institute of Classical Tamil.
From the trenches have emerged fascinating and beautiful artefacts. Among the more decorative items are semi-finished bangles and bracelets made from beryl, a crystalline mineral. Some of these stones are so pure that they are colourless. One find is a tiger-shaped object made of copper, about 15 cm long (see image above).
It was studded with carnelians, sapphires and diamonds. Old quartz stones and broken beads -- of sapphire, beryl, agate, carnelian, amethyst, lapis lazuli, jasper, garnet, soapstone and quartz -- are strewn across the village.
m.rediff.com/business/slide-show/slide-show-1-big-discovery-a-2500-year-old-industrial-estate/20120612.htm#8
