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Riwat (
Rawat, Murree Rawat is a village and union council of Murree Tehsil in the Murree District of Punjab, Pakistan. It is located in the north of the country in the hilly part of Punjab province, near to the border with North-West Frontier Province and Kashmir.
) is a
Paleolithic The Paleolithic or Palaeolithic (), also called the Old Stone Age (from Greek: παλαιός ''palaios'', "old" and λίθος ''lithos'', "stone"), is a period in human prehistory that is distinguished by the original development of stone too ...
site in
Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...
, northern
Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
. Another site, called
Riwat Site 55 Riwat Site 55 is an Upper Palaeolithic archaeological site in the Soan River, Soan Valley, near the village of Rawat, Murree, Rawat in Punjab, Pakistan. It is approximately 45,000 years old and shows human occupation in Pakistan about 45-68,000 y ...
, shows a later occupation dated to around 45,000 years ago.


Site

The site was discovered in 1983. The artifacts consist of flakes and cores made of quartzite. The collection of pebble tools is claimed to be 1.9 million years old and has been disputed because the artifacts weren't found in their original context. The claims of the dating of the site are being continuously researched.


Discovery

Riwat was discovered by the British Archaeological Mission to Pakistan, directed by
F. Raymond Allchin Frank Raymond Allchin, FBA (9 July 1923 – 4 June 2010) was a British archaeologist and Indologist. He and his wife, Bridget Allchin, formed one of the most influential British partnerships in the post-Independence study of South Asian archaeolo ...
and
Bridget Allchin Bridget Allchin (10 February 1927 – 27 June 2017) was an archaeologist who specialised in South Asian archaeology. She published many works, some co-authored with her husband, Raymond Allchin (1923–2010). Background She was born Bridget G ...
(1977–1987), and
Robin Dennell Robin W. Dennell (born 1947) is a British prehistoric archaeologist specialising in early hominin expansions out of Africa and the Palaeolithic of Pakistan and China. He is Professor Emeritus of Human Origins of the University of Sheffield, and ...
(1988–1999). In the early 1980s, the mission set out to investigate the earliest periods in the prehistory of Pakistan, which at that point were only poorly understood, based on the work of
Helmut de Terra Helmut de Terra (4 July 1900 in Guben, Germany – 22 July 1981 in Bern, Switzerland) was a German geologist, explorer, archaeologist, author and anthropologist. Biography Early life Helmut de Terra was born in Germany in 1900 of a family of F ...
and T. T. Paterson in the 1930s. One of the localities described by de Terra and Paterson was a place near the village of Rawat where artefact-bearing
Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...
quartzite Quartzite is a hard, non- foliated metamorphic rock which was originally pure quartz sandstone.Essentials of Geology, 3rd Edition, Stephen Marshak, p 182 Sandstone is converted into quartzite through heating and pressure usually related to tect ...
deposits could be found eroding out of the ridges and slopes of the
Soan Valley The Soan River ( ur, ), also referred to as the Swan, Sawan, or Sohan, is a river in Punjab, Pakistan. Location and geography The Soan River is a stream in the Pothohar or North Punjab region of Pakistan, and drains much of the water of Potho ...
. Revisiting the site, which they called
Riwat Site 55 Riwat Site 55 is an Upper Palaeolithic archaeological site in the Soan River, Soan Valley, near the village of Rawat, Murree, Rawat in Punjab, Pakistan. It is approximately 45,000 years old and shows human occupation in Pakistan about 45-68,000 y ...
, in 1983, the mission discovered prehistoric
stone tool A stone tool is, in the most general sense, any tool made either partially or entirely out of stone. Although stone tool-dependent societies and cultures still exist today, most stone tools are associated with prehistoric (particularly Stone Ag ...
s in good condition, and therefore decided to open an excavation, which was conducted over two seasons by Dennell and Pakistani archaeologist M. Halim. The site was dated to the
Upper Palaeolithic The Upper Paleolithic (or Upper Palaeolithic) is the third and last subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. Very broadly, it dates to between 50,000 and 12,000 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), according to some theories coin ...
, about 45,000 years ago. At the same time, Dennell, together with geologist Helen Rendell, decided to survey the area around Riwat for more Palaeolithic sites. They noted several finds which appeared to be older than those at Site 55, perhaps indicating a
Middle Palaeolithic The Middle Paleolithic (or Middle Palaeolithic) is the second subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age as it is understood in Europe, Africa and Asia. The term Middle Stone Age is used as an equivalent or a synonym for the Middle Paleoli ...
or even
Lower Palaeolithic The Lower Paleolithic (or Lower Palaeolithic) is the earliest subdivision of the Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. It spans the time from around 3 million years ago when the first evidence for stone tool production and use by hominins appears in ...
occupation, but conclusively demonstrating that they were made by human hands, and that they were as old as suspected, proved difficult. In 1985, Rendell and Dennell published a paper in which they argued that some of the Riwat artefacts could be dated to the Lower Palaeolithic, between 400,000 and 700,000 years ago. Later, in 1988, they selected six artefacts which they argued were as much as two million years old, and therefore the earliest evidence of humans outside of Africa known at the time.


Assemblage

The Lower Palaeolithic assemblage at Riwat consists of sixteen pieces of flaked stone that were found at the base of a deeply eroded
gully A gully is a landform created by running water, mass movement, or commonly a combination of both eroding sharply into soil or other relatively erodible material, typically on a hillside or in river floodplains or terraces. Gullies resemble lar ...
. With the exception of
handaxes A hand axe (or handaxe or Acheulean hand axe) is a prehistoric stone tool with two faces that is the longest-used tool in human history, yet there is no academic consensus on what they were used for. It is made from stone, usually flint or cher ...
, the
stone tool A stone tool is, in the most general sense, any tool made either partially or entirely out of stone. Although stone tool-dependent societies and cultures still exist today, most stone tools are associated with prehistoric (particularly Stone Ag ...
s used by hominins in this period (the
Oldowan industry The Oldowan (or Mode I) was a widespread stone tool archaeological industry (style) in prehistory. These early tools were simple, usually made with one or a few flakes chipped off with another stone. Oldowan tools were used during the Lowe ...
) were very simple, consisting of large flakes struck from a
core Core or cores may refer to: Science and technology * Core (anatomy), everything except the appendages * Core (manufacturing), used in casting and molding * Core (optical fiber), the signal-carrying portion of an optical fiber * Core, the central ...
with little preparation or forethought. As a result of this and their great age, they can be difficult to distinguish from pieces of stone that were flaked through natural processes, such as rolling down a slope. Dennell therefore analysed the Riwat assemblage for characteristic features of human modification: bulbs of percussion and ripple marks, indicating that significant force was applied to the core in a single place; a large number of flakes struck from the same core, using up a majority of the core's original surface; flakes struck from different directions; and retouch. Based on this analysis, he presented six pieces which he considered likely to be artefacts: * R001 – a core with six or seven flakes removed, in different directions, leaving only 35% of the original surface untouched. It was found ' with the flaked surfaces embedded in the gully side, ruling out the possibility that it had been flaked after eroding out of its original context. * R008 – a small, retouched flake. * R010 – a small flake. * R011 – a core with two flakes removed. * R013 – a large flake. * R014 – a core with one very large flake and seven smaller flakes removed, with a clear bulb of percussion. A further seven pieces were described as possibly manufactured by hominids, but "equivocal". In 1988 Dennell and his team revisited Riwat and found another flake (R88/1) that they considered likely to be artefactual. They were also able to document that out of more than 1,000 stones in the same deposit, none were flaked (indicating that they were not deposited in an environment where natural flaking was common).


See also

*
History of Pakistan The history of preceding the country's independence in 1947 is shared with that of Afghanistan, India, and Iran. Spanning the western expanse of the Indian subcontinent and the eastern borderlands of the Iranian plateau, the region of prese ...
*
Early human migration Early human migrations are the earliest Human migration, migrations and expansions of Homo, archaic and modern humans across continents. They are believed to have begun approximately 2 million years ago with the early expansions of hominin ...
*
Oldowan The Oldowan (or Mode I) was a widespread stone tool archaeological industry (style) in prehistory. These early tools were simple, usually made with one or a few flakes chipped off with another stone. Oldowan tools were used during the Lower ...
*
Prehistoric Asia Prehistoric Asia refers to events in Asia during the period of human existence prior to the invention of writing systems or the documentation of recorded history. This includes portions of the Eurasian land mass currently or traditionally conside ...
*
Madrasian culture The Madrasian culture is a prehistoric archaeological culture of the Indian subcontinent, dated to the Lower Paleolithic, the earliest subdivision of the Stone Age. It belongs to the Acheulian industry, and some scholars consider the distinction b ...
*
Soanian The Soanian culture is a prehistoric technological culture from the Siwalik Hills in the Indian subcontinent. Quote: “Soanian and Soanian‐like assemblages are known throughout the entire Siwalik or Sub‐ Himalayan region, from Pakistan to n ...
*
South Asian Stone Age The South Asian Stone Age covers the Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic periods in South Asia. Evidence for the most ancient ''Homo sapiens'' in South Asia has been found in the cave sites of Cudappah of India, Batadombalena and Belilena in ...


References

*B. Bower, ''Early Tool Making: An Asian Connection'', Science News (1988). *Rendell, H. and Dennell, R.W. 1987 ''Thermoluminescence Dating of an Upper Pleistocene Site, Northern Pakistan''. Geoarchaeology 2, 63–67. *Roy Larick and Russell L. Ciochon,
The African Emergence and Early Asian Dispersals of the Genus Homo
', American Scientist (1996) *R. W. Dennell, H. M. Rendell and E. Hailwood, ''Late Pliocene Artefacts from Northern Pakistan '', Current Anthropology, Vol. 29, No. 3 (June 1988), pp. 495–498 *R. W. Dennell, H. M. Rendell, M. Halim, E. Moth, "A 45,000-Years-Old open-air Paleolithic Site at Riwat, Northern Pakistan", Journal of Field Archaeology, Vol. 19, No. 1. (Spring, 1992), pp. 17–33. {{Prehistoric Asia 1983 archaeological discoveries Archaeological sites in Punjab, Pakistan Paleolithic sites Murree District