Editing Mehrgarh (section)

==History==
{{See also|Neolithic Revolution|Fertile Crescent|Demic diffusion|Dravidian peoples#Origins}}
Mehrgarh is one of the earliest known sites in [[South Asia]] showing evidence of farming and herding.<ref name="whc.unesco.org">UNESCO World Heritage. 2004. [http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/1876/"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181226013816/http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/1876/ |date=26 December 2018 }}. ''Archaeological Site of Mehrgarh''</ref><ref name="Mehrgarh">Hirst, K. Kris. 2005. [http://archaeology.about.com/od/mterms/g/mehrgarh.htm "Mehrgarh"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170118071157/http://archaeology.about.com/od/mterms/g/mehrgarh.htm |date=18 January 2017 }}. '' Guide to Archaeology''</ref><!-- **START OF NOTE** -->{{refn|group=note|name="Bhirrana"|Excavations at [[Bhirrana]], Haryana, in India between 2006 and 2009, by archaeologist K. N. Dikshit, provided six artifacts, including "relatively advanced pottery," so-called [[Hakra]] ware, which were dated at a time bracket between 7380 and 6201 BCE.<ref name="indusmilleniumold">{{cite web|url=http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/india/121116/indus-civilization-2000-years-old-archaeologists|title=Archeologists confirm Indian civilization is 2000 years older than previously believed, Jason Overdorf, Globalpost, 28 November 2012|access-date=13 December 2018|archive-date=8 July 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160708102945/http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/india/121116/indus-civilization-2000-years-old-archaeologists|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="milleniumold">{{cite web|url=http://www.hindustantimes.com/newdelhi/indus-valley-2-000-years-older-than-thought/article1-954601.aspx|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150209053815/http://www.hindustantimes.com/newdelhi/indus-valley-2-000-years-older-than-thought/article1-954601.aspx|url-status=dead|archive-date=9 February 2015|title=Indus Valley 2,000 years older than thought|date=2012-11-04}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Indus-era-8000-years-old-not-5500-ended-because-of-weaker-monsoon/articleshow/52485332.cms|title=Archeologists confirm Indian civilization is 8000 years old, Jhimli Mukherjee Pandey, Times of India, 29 May 2016|website=[[The Times of India]] |access-date=13 December 2018|archive-date=2 June 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160602101845/http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Indus-era-8000-years-old-not-5500-ended-because-of-weaker-monsoon/articleshow/52485332.cms|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="oldestbhirranna">{{cite web | title=History What their lives reveal | url=http://www.livemint.com/Leisure/ljfXtPZHUSi5eG8Di1n9YO/History--What-their-lives-reveal.html | date=2013-01-04 | access-date=13 December 2018 | archive-date=1 January 2016 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160101160626/http://www.livemint.com/Leisure/ljfXtPZHUSi5eG8Di1n9YO/History--What-their-lives-reveal.html | url-status=live }}</ref> These dates compete with Mehrgarh for being the oldest site for cultural remains in the area.<ref name="oldest">{{cite news | title=Haryana's Bhirrana oldest Harappan site, Rakhigarhi Asia's largest: ASI | url=http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/Haryanas-Bhirrana-oldest-Harappan-site-Rakhigarhi-Asias-largest-ASI/articleshow/46926693.cms | newspaper=The Times of India | date=15 April 2015 | access-date=13 December 2018 | archive-date=1 January 2016 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160101032332/http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/Haryanas-Bhirrana-oldest-Harappan-site-Rakhigarhi-Asias-largest-ASI/articleshow/46926693.cms | url-status=live }}</ref><br /><br /> Yet, Dikshit and Mani clarify that this time-bracket concerns only charcoal samples, which were radio-carbon dated at respectively 7570–7180 BCE (sample 2481) and 6689–6201 BCE (sample 2333).{{sfn|Dikshit|2013|p=132, 131}}{{sfn|Mani|2008|p=237}} Dikshit further writes that the earliest phase concerns 14 shallow dwelling-pits which "could accommodate about 3–4 people."{{sfn|Dikshit|2013|p=129}} According to Dikshit, in the lowest level of these pits wheel-made Hakra Ware was found which was "not well finished,"{{sfn|Dikshit|2013|p=129}} together with other wares.{{sfn|Dikshit|2013|p=130}}}}<!-- **END OF NOTE** --> It was influenced by the [[Neolithic]] culture of the [[Near East]],{{sfn|Gangal|Sarson|Shukurov|2014}} with similarities between "domesticated wheat varieties, early phases of farming, pottery, other archaeological artefacts, some domesticated plants and herd animals."{{sfn|Singh|2016|p=5}}{{refn|group=note|name="Near East"}} According to [[Asko Parpola]], the culture migrated into the [[Indus River|Indus Valley]] and became the [[Indus Valley Civilisation]] of the [[Bronze Age]].{{sfn|Parpola|2015|p=17}}

[[Jean-François Jarrige|Jean-Francois Jarrige]] argues for an independent origin of Mehrgarh. Jarrige notes "the assumption that farming economy was introduced full-fledged from Near-East to South Asia,"<ref name="Jarrige">Jean-Francois Jarrige [http://www.archaeology.up.nic.in/doc/mn_jfj.pdf ''Mehrgarh Neolithic''] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303221610/http://archaeology.up.nic.in/doc/mn_jfj.pdf |date=3 March 2016 }}, Paper presented in the International Seminar on the "First Farmers in Global Perspective," Lucknow, India, 18–20 January 2006</ref><!--** to START OF NOTE**-->{{refn|group=note|name="Near East"|According to Gangal et al. (2014), there is strong archeological and geographical evidence that neolithic farming spread from the Near East into north-west India.{{sfn|Gangal|Sarson|Shukurov|2014}}{{sfn|Singh|2016}} Gangal et al. (2014):{{sfn|Gangal|Sarson|Shukurov|2014}} "There are several lines of evidence that support the idea of a connection between the Neolithic in the Near East and the subcontinent. The prehistoric site of Mehrgarh in Baluchistan (modern Pakistan) is the earliest Neolithic site in the northwest of the subcontinent, dated as early as 8500 BCE.[18]<ref>Possehl GL (1999) Indus Age: The Beginnings. Philadelphia: Univ. Pennsylvania Press.</ref><br /><br />Neolithic domesticated crops in Mehrgarh include more than 90% barley and a small amount of wheat. There is good evidence for the local domestication of barley and the zebu cattle at Mehrgarh [19],<ref name=" Jarrige JF 2008">Jarrige JF (2008) Mehrgarh Neolithic. Pragdhara 18: 136–154</ref> [20],<ref>Costantini L (2008) The first farmers in Western Pakistan: the evidence of the Neolithic agropastoral settlement of Mehrgarh. Pragdhara 18: 167–178</ref> but the wheat varieties are suggested to be of Near-Eastern origin, as the modern distribution of wild varieties of wheat is limited to Northern Levant and Southern Turkey [21].<ref>Fuller DQ (2006) Agricultural origins and frontiers in South Asia: a working synthesis. J World Prehistory 20: 1–86</ref> A detailed satellite map study of a few archaeological sites in the Baluchistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regions also suggests similarities in early phases of farming with sites in Western Asia [22].<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Petrie | first1 = CA | last2 = Thomas | first2 = KD | year = 2012 | title = The topographic and environmental context of the earliest village sites in western South Asia | journal = Antiquity | volume = 86 | issue = 334| pages = 1055–1067 | doi=10.1017/s0003598x00048249| s2cid = 131732322 }}</ref> Pottery prepared by sequential slab construction, circular fire pits filled with burnt pebbles, and large granaries are common to both Mehrgarh and many Mesopotamian sites [23].<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Goring-Morris | first1 = AN | last2 = Belfer-Cohen | first2 = A | year = 2011 | title = Neolithization processes in the Levant: the outer envelope | journal = Curr Anthropol | volume = 52 | pages = S195–S208 | doi=10.1086/658860| s2cid = 142928528 }}</ref> The postures of the skeletal remains in graves at Mehrgarh bear strong resemblance to those at [[Ali Kosh]] in the Zagros Mountains of southern Iran [19].<ref name=" Jarrige JF 2008">Jarrige JF (2008) Mehrgarh Neolithic. Pragdhara 18: 136–154</ref> Clay figurines found in Mehrgarh resemble those discovered at [[Teppe Zagheh]] on the Qazvin plain south of the Elburz range in Iran (the 7th millennium BCE) and [[Jeitun]] in Turkmenistan (the 6th millennium BCE) [24].<ref>Jarrige C (2008) The figurines of the first farmers at Mehrgarh and their offshoots. Pragdhara 18: 155–166</ref> Strong arguments have been made for the Near-Eastern origin of some domesticated plants and herd animals at Jeitun in Turkmenistan (pp. 225–227 in [25]).<ref name=" Harris DR 2010">Harris DR (2010) Origins of Agriculture in Western Central Asia: An Environmental-Archaeological Study. Philadelphia: Univ. Pennsylvania Press.</ref><br /><br />The Near East is separated from the Indus Valley by the arid plateaus, ridges, and deserts of Iran and Afghanistan, where rainfall agriculture is possible only in the foothills and cul-de-sac valleys [26].<ref name=" Hiebert FT 2002">Hiebert FT, Dyson RH (2002) Prehistoric Nishapur and the frontier between Central Asia and Iran. Iranica Antiqua XXXVII: 113–149</ref> Nevertheless, this area was not an insurmountable obstacle for the dispersal of the Neolithic. The route south of the Caspian sea is a part of the Silk Road, some sections of which were in use from at least 3,000 BCE, connecting Badakhshan (north-eastern Afghanistan and south-eastern Tajikistan) with Western Asia, Egypt, and India [27].<ref>Kuzmina EE, Mair VH (2008) The Prehistory of the Silk Road. Philadelphia: Univ. Pennsylvania Press</ref> Similarly, the section from Badakhshan to the Mesopotamian plains (the [[Great Khorasan Road]]) was apparently functioning by 4,000 BCE, and numerous prehistoric sites are located along with it, whose assemblages are dominated by the [[Cheshmeh-Ali (Shahr-e-Rey)|Cheshmeh-Ali]] (Tehran Plain) ceramic technology, forms and designs [26].<ref name=" Hiebert FT 2002" /> Striking similarities in figurines and pottery styles, and mud-brick shapes, between widely separated early Neolithic sites in the Zagros Mountains of north-western Iran (Jarmo and Sarab), the Deh Luran Plain in southwestern Iran (Tappeh [[Ali Kosh]] and Chogha Sefid), Susiana (Chogha Bonus and Chogha Mish), the Iranian Central Plateau ([[Sang-i Chakmak|Tappeh-Sang-e Chakhmaq]]), and Turkmenistan (Jeitun) suggest a common incipient culture [28].<ref>Alizadeh A (2003) Excavations at the prehistoric mound of Chogha Bonus, Khuzestan, Iran. Technical report, University of Chicago, Illinois.</ref> The Neolithic dispersal across South Asia plausibly involved migration of the population ([29]<ref>Dolukhanov P (1994) Environment and Ethnicity in the Ancient Middle East. Aldershot: Ashgate.</ref> and [25], pp. 231–233).<ref name=" Harris DR 2010">Harris DR (2010) Origins of Agriculture in Western Central Asia: An Environmental-Archaeological Study. Philadelphia: Univ. Pennsylvania Press.</ref> This possibility is also supported by Y-chromosome and mtDNA analyses [30],<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Quintana-Murci | first1 = L | last2 = Krausz | first2 = C | last3 = Zerjal | first3 = T | last4 = Sayar | first4 = SH | last5 = Hammer | first5 = MF |display-authors=etal  | year = 2001 | title = Y-chromosome lineages trace diffusion of people and languages in Southwestern Asia | journal = Am J Hum Genet | volume = 68 | issue = 2| pages = 537–542 | doi=10.1086/318200 | pmid=11133362 | pmc=1235289}}</ref> [31]."<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Quintana-Murci | first1 = L | last2 = Chaix | first2 = R | last3 = Spencer Wells | first3 = R | last4 = Behar | first4 = DM | last5 = Sayar | first5 = H |display-authors=etal  | year = 2004 | title = Where West meets East: the complex mtDNA landscape of the Southwest and Central Asian corridor | journal = Am J Hum Genet | volume = 74 | issue = 5| pages = 827–845 | doi=10.1086/383236 | pmid=15077202 | pmc=1181978}}</ref>}}<!--**END OF NOTE**--> and the similarities between Neolithic sites from eastern [[Mesopotamia]] and the western Indus Valley, which are evidence of a "cultural continuum" between those sites. However, given the originality of Mehrgarh, Jarrige concludes that Mehrgarh has an earlier local background," and is not a "'backwater' of the Neolithic culture of the Near East."<ref name="Jarrige" />

[[File: Site Location of Mehrgarh.jpg|thumb|left|Site location of Mehrgarh]]
[[John R. Lukacs|Lukacs]] and Hemphill suggest an initial local development of Mehrgarh, with continuity in cultural development but a population change.<ref>Brian E. Hemphill, John R. Lukacs, K.A.R. Kennedy, [https://www.harappa.com/content/biological-adaptations-and-affinities-bronze-age-harappans Biological Adaptations and Affinities of Bronze Age Harappans.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220724130622/https://www.harappa.com/content/biological-adaptations-and-affinities-bronze-age-harappans |date=24 July 2022 }} Chapter 11 of Harappa Excavation Reports 1986-1990</ref> According to Lukacs and Hemphill, while there is a strong continuity between the Neolithic and [[Chalcolithic]] cultures of Mehrgarh, dental evidence shows that the Chalcolithic population did not descend from the Neolithic population of Mehrgarh,{{sfn|Coningham|Young|2015|p=114}} which "suggests moderate levels of [[gene flow]]."{{sfn|Coningham|Young|2015|p=114}} They wrote that "the direct lineal descendants of the Neolithic inhabitants of Mehrgarh are to be found to the south and the east of Mehrgarh, [[Pakistan]] in [[North India|northwestern India]] and the western edge of the [[Deccan Plateau]]," with Neolithic Mehrgarh showing greater affinity with Chalcolithic [[Inamgaon]], south of Mehrgarh, than with Chalcolithic Mehrgarh.{{sfn|Coningham|Young|2015|p=114}}<!--** START OF NOTE **-->{{refn|group=note|Genetic research shows a complex pattern of human migrations.{{sfn|Singh|2016}} Kivisild et al. (1999) note that "a small fraction of the West Eurasian mtDNA lineages found in Indian populations can be ascribed to a relatively recent admixture."{{sfn|Kivisild|1999|p=1331}} at c. 9,300 ± 3,000 years before present,{{sfn|Kivisild|1999|p=1333}} which coincides with "the arrival to India of cereals domesticated in the [[Fertile Crescent]]" and "lends credence to the suggested [[Elamo-Dravidian languages|linguistic connection]] between the Elamite and Dravidic populations."{{sfn|Kivisild|1999|p=1333}} Singh et al. (2016) investigated the distribution of J2a-M410 and J2b-M102 in South Asia, which "suggested a complex scenario that cannot be explained by a single wave of agricultural expansion from Near East to South Asia,"{{sfn|Singh|2016}} but also notes that "regardless of the complexity of dispersal, NW region appears to be the corridor for entry of these haplogroups into India."{{sfn|Singh|2016}}}}<!--** END OF NOTE **-->

Gallego Romero et al. (2011) state that their research on [[Lactase persistence|lactose tolerance]] in [[India]] suggests that "the west Eurasian genetic contribution identified by Reich et al. (2009) principally reflects gene flow from [[Pakistan]], [[Iran]] and the [[Middle East]]."{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=9}} Gallego Romero notes that [[Indian people|Indians]] who are lactose-tolerant show a genetic pattern regarding this tolerance which is "characteristic of the common [[Europe]]an mutation."<ref name="ScienceLife2011">{{Cite web |url=http://sciencelife.uchospitals.edu/2011/09/14/lactose-tolerance-in-the-indian-dairyland/ |title=Rob Mitchum (2011), ''Lactose Tolerance in the Indian Dairyland'', ScienceLife |access-date=8 July 2016 |archive-date=6 December 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201206034842/https://sciencelife.uchospitals.edu/2011/09/14/lactose-tolerance-in-the-indian-dairyland/ |url-status=live }}</ref> According to Romero, this suggests that "the most common lactose tolerance mutation made a two-way migration out of the Middle East less than 10,000 years ago. While the mutation spread across Europe, another explorer must have brought the mutation eastward to India – likely traveling along the coast of the [[Persian Gulf]] where other pockets of the same mutation have been found."<ref name="ScienceLife2011" /> They further note that "[t]he earliest evidence of cattle herding in south Asia comes from the Indus River Valley site of Mehrgarh and is dated to 7,000 YBP."{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=9}}{{refn|group=note|Gallego Romero et al. (2011) refer to (Meadow 1993):{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=9}} Meadow RH. 1993. ''Animal domestication in the Middle East: a revised view from the eastern margin.'' In: Possehl G, editor. ''Harappan civilization''. New Delhi (India): Oxford University Press and India Book House. p 295–320.{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=12}}}}