[Trending News] Go see India's Stonehenge. Our country is dotted with megalithic structures

In the years following the COVID-19 pandemic, Stonehenge in the UK has seen a steady rise in visitors, with the prehistoric monument attracting over 1.3 million tourists in 2023. The megalithic structures of Stonehenge date back to 2500 BCE and are among the UK’s most iconic landmarks, drawing travellers from around the globe. Megaliths, or ‘large stones,’ are not limited to Stonehenge. From the mid-third millennium BCE to the second millennium BCEthey were a global phenomenonand are found in parts of Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America. These monuments are diverse in form and signify the marvels of the ancient world.

While megalithic monuments like Stonehenge have gained worldwide popularity, those in India rarely make it onto travellers’ routeies. Contemporary with Stonehenge’s constructionsimilar prehistoric mega–stone monuments emerged across the Indian subcontinent, varying in shape and size but sharing a sense of oneness.

Ancient societies erected massive stones in various forms to commemorate the dead and celebrate lifea practice that united continents. Sadly, while many of us have Stonehenge on our bucket lists, we are all guilty of ignoring the wonders of Hire Benakal in Karnataka. This, therefore, is an ode to the wonderful world of Indian megaliths.

The Indian megaliths

Megaliths were first recognised by scholars in India in the 19th century, following the discovery of a few megalithic burials by J Babington in 1823 at Bangla Motta Paramba in Kerala’s Kannur district. Since then, over 3,000 megalithic sites have been documented across the Indian subcontinent—from Jammu and Kashmir to Kerala and from Nagaland to Tamil Nadu—with a heavy concentration in Central and Peninsular India.

As extensive as their spatial distribution, megaliths also exhibit a remarkable variety in form. They appear as upright stones (menhirs), stone circles (cairns), tomb–like structures (dolmens), or rock–cut chambers such as urns and sarcophagi. In parts of South India, some burials are marked by carved monoliths known as anthropomorphic figures. Scholars have noted that the geological features and available raw materials of a region influence the typology of megalithic burials (Krishnaswami 1949). They have also observed that megaliths do not form a homogeneous entity but belong to different cultural and chronological contexts.

Acknowledging that megaliths were built for various purposes—some ceremonial, some commemorativeand others funerary—US Moorti, in 1994, was one of the first scholars who tried to classify them. He categorised them into sepulchral megaliths, which include burial pits, chambers, and both legged, and un-legged burials, and non-sepulchral megaliths, which are commemorative or memorial in nature. This classification is supported by the fact that many megalithic burials lack complete skeletal remains and often contain only fragmentary bones along with artefacts.

When these burials were first discovered, early investigations were largely antiquarian in nature. However, Mortimer Wheeler’s 1948 excavation at Brahmagiri In Karnataka gave the research a new direction—toward exploring the chrono-cultural aspects of these mysterious yet mystifying monuments. More than 100 years after the discovery of megaliths in Indiait is time to look beyond their age and origins to understand the people behind this enduring tradition.

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Also read: Tamil Nadu’s Iron Age report is a turning point in Indian archaeology. It needs more research

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Whispers of stones

The tradition of building megaliths is evidently linked to the cultural context of their creators. To understand this, over 100 sites have been excavated, including many habitation sites associated with megaliths. These excavations have yielded enormous data on the nature, architecture, and contents of the burials, as well as the settlement patterns linked to them.

Archaeological dataparticularly Faunal Evidence from Sites Like Maski, Sanur, Junapani, Brahmagiri, Nagarjunakonda, Sanganakallu, Takalghat, T Narasipur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur, Hallur Abankur, and raipur, have revealed that pastoralism played a major role in the megalithic economy. Hunting wild animals and fishing also contributed to their subsistence. Bones of domestic animals such as cattle, buffalo, sheep, goats, pigs, horses, asses, and dogs, along with remains of many wild animals, have been found at these sites. Archaeobotanical remains of rice, barley, wheat, kodo millet, Job’s tear, common pea, lentil, grass pea, horse gram, red gram, Indian jujube from megalithic sites provide significant insights into the diet of these communities.

The discovery of many metal objects—made of copper, bronze, and iron—at both burial and habitation sites suggests that these people were skilled metallurgists. More so in southern Indiawhere megaliths are synonymous with the Iron Age.

Although the origins of this practice remain unclearscholars believe it may have begun before the Iron Age and became more widespread during this period. Initially thought to date to the South Indian Iron Age (roughly 1200 BCE–500 BCE), the tradition of erecting megaliths might have begun even earlier, possibly in the middle of the preceding Neolithic or New Stone Age (c. 2500 BCE) (Menon 2018). While megaliths are generally accepted as monuments of the Iron Age in South India, Kathleen Morrison’s analysis of a charcoal sample from Wheeler’s Brahmagiri excavation yielded a date of 2100 BCE, fuelling speculation that megalith building may have originated in the South Indian Neolithic, with its widespread practice arguably taking hold in the Iron Age.

But what if the Iron Age itself dates back to the third millennium BCE? Recent radiometric dates from multiple Iron Age sites in Tamil Nadu are pushing back the period’s chronology, prompting scholars to rethink long-held assumptions. While this may not answer every research questionone thing is certain: the tradition of using large, unworked stones as shrines or commemorative monuments continued well into later periods—perhaps even into the medieval era, as seen in the practice of erecting cenotaphs. The idea of celebrating lives once lived is something we all share. The only difference is that in the ancient world it began with erecting Megalithswhile we leave imprints in the cloud—digital cloud.

Disha Ahluwalia is an archaeologist and research fellow at the Indian Council Of Historical Research. Views are personal. She tweets @ahluwaliadisha.

(Edited by aamaan alam khan)