Jwalapuram
Topic: Prehistory: Human Origins and Stone Age Cultures · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
Jwalapuram is a prehistoric site in the Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh. Here, archaeologists found Middle Palaeolithic stone tools both below and above a thick layer of volcanic ash. The ash came from the Toba super-eruption in Sumatra (Indonesia), c. 74,000 years ago. The site matters because it suggests that tool-making people lived in India before this huge eruption and survived after it.
Example
At Jwalapuram, flake tools such as scrapers and points (small stone tools struck off a larger stone) lie under and over the Toba ash layer. This shows that tool-making continued in the region after c. 74,000 years ago. Scholars still debate which human species made these tools.
Don't confuse with
- Jwalamukhi is a temple town in Himachal Pradesh, famous for its natural gas flames. It has nothing to do with Stone Age tools.
Related concepts
- Palaeolithic age
- Acheulian tradition
- Handaxe
- Attirampakkam
- Isampur
- Hunsgi valley
- Pallavaram
- Didwana
- Soanian culture
- Hathnora