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Palaeoenvironmental dynamics and Palaeolithic occupation at Katoati, Thar Desert, India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 March 2017

James Blinkhorn ,
Hema Achyuthan ,
Peter Ditchfield  and
Michael Petraglia
James Blinkhorn*
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool, 12-14 Abercromby Square, Liverpool, L69 7WZ, United Kingdom Department of Archaeology, Max-Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany
Hema Achyuthan
Affiliation:
Department of Geology, Anna University, Sardar Patel Road, Chennai 600025, India
Peter Ditchfield
Affiliation:
School of Archaeology, Research Laboratory for Archaeology and History of Art, University of Oxford, 75 George Street, Oxford OX1 2BQ, United Kingdom
Michael Petraglia
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, Max-Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany
*
*Corresponding author at: Department of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool, 12-14 Abercromby Square, Liverpool, L69 7WZ, United Kingdom. E-mail address: j.blinkhorn@liverpool.ac.uk (J. Blinkhorn).
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Abstract

Late Pleistocene palaeoenvironments in the Thar Desert (India), located at the eastern extent of the Saharo-Arabian desert belt, have fluctuated considerably as a result of the varying range and intensity of the Indian summer monsoon. Phases of widespread Pleistocene aridity are well documented in the Thar Desert, but research focusing on humid proxies is critical to examine how the region may have facilitated population expansions across southern Asia. At Katoati, located on the northeast margin of the Thar Desert, the combination of field recording of sediment sections with detailed analyses (micromorphology, stable isotope, loss on ignition, magnetic susceptibility, and X-ray fluorescence) from an archaeological site identify a series of hominin occupations during phases of enhanced humidity between ~96 and 60 ka. A gradient of humidity on the eastern margin of the Thar Desert during the late Pleistocene is identified, with the periodic humidity evident at Katoati occurring more frequently and with longer duration towards the southern margin. This uneven distribution of humidity in the Thar Desert is likely to have strongly influenced when and where hominin populations could expand into and across the region.

Keywords

Thar DesertSouth AsiaMonsoonlate PleistoceneMiddle PalaeolithicModern human dispersal
Type
Research Article
Information
Quaternary Research , Volume 87 , Issue 2 , March 2017 , pp. 298 - 313
Copyright
Copyright © University of Washington. Published by Cambridge University Press, 2017 

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