New insights into the geological evolution of palaeorivers and their relationship to the Indus Civilization and Early Historic settlements on the plains of Haryana, NW India
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Authors
Alok, Apurva
Pant, NC
Das, Kaushik
Tsutsumi, Y
Petrie, CA
Kumar, Pankaj
Chopra, Sundeep
Saini, HS
Khan, Abul Amir
Publication Date
2022-09Journal Title
Geological Society, London, Special Publications
ISSN
0305-8719
Publisher
Geological Society of London
Pages
sp515-2020-161
Type
Article
This Version
AM
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Alok, A., Pant, N., Das, K., Tsutsumi, Y., Petrie, C., Kumar, P., Chopra, S., et al. (2022). New insights into the geological evolution of palaeorivers and their relationship to the Indus Civilization and Early Historic settlements on the plains of Haryana, NW India. Geological Society, London, Special Publications, sp515-2020-161. https://doi.org/10.1144/sp515-2020-161
Abstract
The Quaternary sediments and landscapes of the plains of northwestern Haryana and the ancient settlement mounds distributed across them have great potential to reveal the history of the evolution and disappearance of palaeorivers and their relationship to the Indus Civilization and Early Historic periods in NW India. There are numerous palaeochannels in Haryana, and their distribution and burial in the subsurface creates difficulties for accessing the archives and proxies necessary for developing insight into the timing of river flow and shift, and its relationship to settled populations. This paper investigates the deep and shallow subsurface sedimentary lithology of an area around Sirsa that is close to the course of the modern Ghagghar River. The paper presents additional age constraints provided by dates from the site at Rakhigarhi and examines a sedimentary substrate of a new archaeological mound situated on a palaeochannel identified at a mound near Dhir village. New AMS radiocarbon dates of drifted charcoal from natural and cultural strata suggest human activity and/or natural burning in this region as early as 10 405–10 190 cal years BP (8455–8240 cal years BC). The substrate sediments recorded at the Dhir mound indicate flooding events after the urban phase of the Indus Civilization.
Sponsorship
European Research Council (648609)
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BB/P027970/1)
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.1144/sp515-2020-161
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/333722
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