 800 BCE | |
| Type site | Swat Protohistoric Graveyards Complex |
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| History of South Asia | ||||||||||||||
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Chalcolithic (3500–1500 BC)
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Bronze Age (3300–1300 BC)
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Macedonian Empire | (330–323 BC) | |||||||||||||
| Maurya Empire | (321–184 BC) | |||||||||||||
| Seleucid India | (312–303 BC) | |||||||||||||
| Sangam period | (c. 600 BC – c. 300 AD) | |||||||||||||
| Pandya Empire | (c. 300 BC – AD 1345) | |||||||||||||
| Chera Kingdom | (c. 300 BC – AD 1102) | |||||||||||||
| Chola Empire | (c. 300 BC – AD 1279) | |||||||||||||
| Pallava Empire | (c. 250 AD – AD 800) | |||||||||||||
| Maha-Megha-Vahana Empire | (c. 250 BC – c. AD 500) | |||||||||||||
| Parthian Empire | (247 BC – AD 224) |
| Ghaznavid Dynasty | (977–1186) |
| Ghurid Dynasty | (1170–1206) |
| Delhi Sultanate | (1206–1526) |
| – Mamluk Sultanate | (1206–1290) |
| – Khalji Sultanate | (1290–1320) |
| – Tughlaq Sultanate | (1320–1414) |
| – Sayyid Sultanate | (1414–1451) |
| – Lodi Sultanate | (1451–1526) |
| Ahom Kingdom | (1228–1826) |
| Chitradurga Kingdom | (1300–1779) |
| Reddy Kingdom | (1325–1448) |
| Vijayanagara Empire | (1336–1646) |
| Bengal Sultanate | (1352–1576) |
| Garhwal Kingdom | (1358–1803) |
| Mysore Kingdom | (1399–1947) |
| Gajapati Empire | (1434–1541) |
| Ladakh Kingdom | (1470–1842) |
| Deccan Sultanates | (1490–1596) |
| – Ahmadnagar Sultanate | (1490–1636) |
| – Berar Sultanate | (1490–1574) |
| – Bidar Sultanate | (1492–1619) |
| – Bijapur Sultanate | (1492–1686) |
| – Golkonda Sultanate | (1518–1687) |
| Keladi Kingdom | (1499–1763) |
| Koch Kingdom | (1515–1947) |
| Portuguese India | (1510–1961) |
| Dutch India | (1605–1825) |
| Danish India | (1620–1869) |
| French India | (1759–1954) |
| Company Raj | (1757–1858) |
| British Raj | (1858–1947) |
The Gandhara grave culture of present-day Pakistan is known by its "protohistoric graves", which were spread mainly in the middle Swat River valley and named the Swat Protohistoric Graveyards Complex, dated in that region to c. 1200–800 BCE.[1] The Italian Archaeological Mission to Pakistan (MAIP) holds that there are no burials with these features after 800 BCE.[2] More recent studies by Pakistani scholars, such as Muhammad Zahir, consider that these protohistoric graves extended over a much wider geography and continued in existence from the 8th century BCE until the historic period.[3] The core region was in the middle of the Swat River course and expanded to the valleys of Dir, Kunar, Chitral, and Peshawar.[4] Protohistoric graves were present in north, central, and southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province as well as in north-western tribal areas, including Gilgit-Baltistan province, Taxila, and Salt Range in Punjab, Pakistan, along with their presence in Indian Kashmir, Ladakh, and Uttarakhand.[5]
The grave culture has been regarded as a token of the Indo-Aryan migrations but has also been explained by local cultural continuity. Estimates, based on ancient DNA analyses, suggest ancestors of middle Swat valley people mixed with a population coming from the Inner Asian Mountain Corridor, which carried Steppe ancestry, sometime between 1900 and 1500 BCE.[6]
Close to the end of the second millennium BCE, large graveyards appear in northern Gandhara (middle Swat River valley), featuring mainly inhumations (c. 1200–900 BCE), the so-called Gandhara grave culture by earlier scholars, a period in which iron technology was introduced.[7] These graveyard types expanded to the northwest into Chitral, around Singoor, featuring burial traditions similar to protohistoric graves between the 8th century BCE and 17th century CE.[8]
A constant funeral tradition with pottery and similar artifacts can be found along the banks of the
Re-evaluation of the findings suggests this so-called Gandhara Grave Culture was actually a burial tradition, spread across a wide geographical area, rather than a specific culture.[10] There are more than thirty cemeteries of this tradition found in Swat and the surrounding valleys of Dir, Buner, Malakand, Chitral, and in the Valley of Peshawar to the south, featuring cist graves, where large stone slabs were used to line the pit, above which another large flat stone was laid, forming a roof. Related settlement sites have also been found, increasing our knowledge of the culture.[11]
Anthropomorphic urns with cremation remains were not frequently found in graves, and the most common pottery within these graves is Burnished Grey Ware and Burnished Red Ware, along with human terracotta figurines. However, later graves are more elaborate, featuring more items, including horse remains and horse furniture.[12]
Northern Gandhara, in the middle region of the Swat River, presents deposits of Black Burnished Ware, prior to the Gandhara grave culture, during the Ghalegay IV period, c. 1700–1400 BCE.[13] New research, based on 34 excavated graves in Udegram, and in the nearby site of Gogdhara, has uncovered two Gandhara grave culture burial phases, the first between 1400 and 1100 BCE, and the second from 1000 to 800 BCE, with an inter-phase in Gogdhara, from 1200 to 900 BCE.[14]
Single burials are characteristic of the early phase of Gandhara grave culture, along with bronze objects and pottery within the graves. Cremation is distinctive in the middle phase, and ashes were laid in large jars, often bearing a human-like face design. These jars were frequently placed in circular pits, surrounded by objects of bronze, gold, and pottery. Multiple burials and fractional remains are found in the later phase, along with iron objects, coeval with the beginning of urban centers of Taxila and Charsadda.[15]
The polished black-gray pottery has been associated with that of other BMAC sites, like Dashly in Afghanistan, Tepe Hissar, and Tureng Tepe. According to Asko Parpola, the presence of black-red pottery also suggests links with Cemetery H culture in Punjab. The burial of bodies, the metal pins used for fastening clothes, and the terracotta statuettes of females, says Parpola, are similar to those found at BMAC. Graves during the Ghalegay V period, c. 1400–1000 BCE, may be connected with those in Vakhsh and Bishkent Valley. Parpola adds that these graves represent a mix of the practices found in the northern Bactrian portion of BMAC, during the period of 1700–1400 BCE and the Fedorovo Andronovo culture.[16]
According to
Parpola has argued that the Gandhara grave culture is "by no means identical with the
... to attribute a historical value to [...] the slender links with northwestern Iran and northern Afghanistan [...] is a mistake[, since] it could well be the spread of particular objects and, as such, objects that could circulate more easily quite apart from any real contacts.[20]
According to Kennedy, who argues for local cultural continuity, Gandhara grave culture people shared biological affinities with the population of Neolithic
Antonini,[24] Stacul,[25] and other scholars argue that this culture is also not related to the Bishkent culture and Vakhsh culture of Tajikistan.[26] However, Kuz'mina argues the opposite on the basis of both archaeology and the human remains from the separate cultures.[27]
Narasimhan et al., 2018, analyzed DNA of 362 ancient skeletons from Central and South Asia, including those from the Iron Age grave sites discovered in the Swat valley of Pakistan (between 1200 BCE and 1 CE from
