Ganges_and_the_Shivalik_ranges,_near_Rishikesh

The Sivalik Hills, also known as the Shivalik Hills and Churia Hills, are a mountain range of the outer Himalayas that stretches over about from the

Indus River The Indus ( ) is a transboundary river of Asia and a trans-Himalayan river of South and Central Asia. The river rises in mountain springs northeast of Mount Kailash in Western Tibet, flows northwest through the disputed region of Kashmir ...

eastwards close to the

Brahmaputra River The Brahmaputra is a trans-boundary river which flows through Tibet, northeast India, and Bangladesh. It is also known as the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibetan, the Siang/Dihang River in Arunachali, Luit in Assamese, and Jamuna River in Bangla. ...

, spanning the northern parts of the Indian subcontinent. It is wide with an average elevation of . Between the Teesta and Raidāk Rivers in

Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur t ...

is a gap of about . "Sivalik"

literally ''Literally'' is an English adverb. It has been controversially used as an intensifier for figurative statements. History The first known use of the word ''literally'' was in the 15th century, or the 1530s, when it was used in the sense of "in ...

means 'tresses of Shiva'. Sivalik region is home to the

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 ...

archaeological culture.

Geology

Geologically, the Sivalik Hills belong to the

Tertiary Tertiary ( ) is a widely used but obsolete term for the geologic period from 66 million to 2.6 million years ago. The period began with the demise of the non-avian dinosaurs in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, at the start ...

deposits A deposit account is a bank account maintained by a financial institution in which a customer can deposit and withdraw money. Deposit accounts can be savings accounts, current accounts or any of several other types of accounts explained below. ...

of the outer Himalayas. They are chiefly composed of sandstone and conglomerate rock formations, which are the solidified detritus of the Himalayas to their north; they are poorly consolidated. The remnant magnetisation of

siltstone Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility.Blatt ''et al.'' 1980, ...

s and sandstones indicates that they were deposited 16–5.2 million years ago. In Nepal, the

Karnali River Karnali may refer to: Places in Nepal * Karnali Bridge, a bridge over the Karnali River in Nepal * Karnali Highway, a vital transport link in Nepal *Karnali Province, a federal province in Nepal * Karnali River, a river in Nepal and India origina ...

exposes the oldest part of the Shivalik Hills. They are bounded on the south by a fault system called the Main Frontal Thrust, with steeper slopes on that side. Below this, the coarse alluvial

Bhabar Bhabar or Bhabhar ( Kumaoni: bhābar) is a region south of the Lower Himalayas and the Sivalik Hills in Kumaon, India, containing some of the largest cities of Kumaon, Haldwani and Ramnagar, both in Nainital District. It is the alluvial apron ...

zone makes the transition to the nearly level plains. Rainfall, especially during the summer monsoon, percolates into the Bhabar, then is forced to the surface by finer alluvial layers below it in a zone of springs and marshes along the northern edge of the

Terai , image =Terai nepal.jpg , image_size = , image_alt = , caption =Aerial view of Terai plains near Biratnagar, Nepal , map = , map_size = , map_alt = , map_caption = , biogeographic_realm = Indomalayan realm , global200 = Terai-Duar savanna ...

or plains.

Prehistory

Remains of the Lower Paleolithic

culture dating to around 500,000 to 125,000 BP were found in the Sivalik region. Contemporary to the

Acheulean Acheulean (; also Acheulian and Mode II), from the French ''acheuléen'' after the type site of Saint-Acheul, is an archaeological industry of stone tool manufacture characterized by the distinctive oval and pear-shaped " hand axes" associate ...

, the Soanian culture is named after 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 Pot ...

in the Sivalik Hills of Pakistan. The Soanian archaeological culture is found across Sivalik region in present-day India, Nepal and Pakistan. ''

Sivapithecus ''Sivapithecus'' () (syn: ''Ramapithecus)'' is a genus of extinct apes. Fossil remains of animals now assigned to this genus, dated from 12.2 million years old in the Miocene, have been found since the 19th century in the Siwalik Hills of the In ...

'' (a kind of

ape Apes (collectively Hominoidea ) are a clade of Old World simians native to sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia (though they were more widespread in Africa, most of Asia, and as well as Europe in prehistory), which together with its sister g ...

, formerly known as ''Ramapithecus'') is among many fossil finds in the Sivalik region. A number of fossil ratites were reported from the Sivalik Hills, including the extinct

Asian ostrich The Asian or Asiatic ostrich (''Struthio asiaticus''), is an extinct species of ostrich that lived during the Neogene period on the Indian subcontinent. The early records that ranged from the Pliocene epoch in Africa to Pleistocene- Holocene epoc ...

, ''

Dromaius ''Dromaius'' (from greek δρομαίυς "runner") is a genus of ratite present in Australia. There is one extant species, ''Dromaius novaehollandiae'' commonly known as the emu. In his original 1816 description of the emu, Louis Jean Pierre Vi ...

sivalensis'' and ''

Hypselornis ''Hypselornis'' is an extinct genus of fossil reptile, most likely a crocodilian, from the late Pliocene of India. Known only from a single toe bone, ''Hypselornis'' was originally mistakenly identified as a ratite bird related to the living cass ...

''. However, the latter two species were named only from toe bones that have since been identified as belonging to an

ungulate Ungulates ( ) are members of the diverse clade Ungulata which primarily consists of large mammals with hooves. These include odd-toed ungulates such as horses, rhinoceroses, and tapirs; and even-toed ungulates such as cattle, pigs, giraffes, c ...

mammal and a

crocodilian Crocodilia (or Crocodylia, both ) is an Order (biology), order of mostly large, predatory, semiaquatic reptiles, known as crocodilians. They first appeared 95 million years ago in the Late Cretaceous Period (geology), period (Cenomanian St ...

, respectively.

Demographics

The low human population density in the Sivalik Hills and along the steep southern slopes of the Lower Himalayan Range created a cultural, linguistic, and political buffer zone between populations in the

plains In geography, a plain is a flat expanse of land that generally does not change much in elevation, and is primarily treeless. Plains occur as lowlands along valleys or at the base of mountains, as coastal plains, and as plateaus or uplands. I ...

to the south and the hills beyond the Mahabharat escarpment, enabling different evolutionary paths with respect to language and culture.

In culture

The Indian Navy's ''Shivalik''-class frigate is named after these ranges.

References

{{Uttarakhand Mountain ranges of the Himalayas Mountain ranges of Asia Mountain ranges of Bhutan Mountain ranges of India Mountain ranges of Nepal Mountain ranges of Pakistan Hills of Jammu and Kashmir Hills of Uttarakhand Hills of Himachal Pradesh Hills of Sikkim Himalayan subtropical broadleaf forests

Geology

Prehistory

Demographics

In culture

See also

References