Place · Chalcolithic copper-working site · India
Ganeshwar-Jodhpura
The Ganeshwar-Jodhpura Chalcolithic cultural horizon in Sikar district, Rajasthan, c.3800-2800 BCE — the earliest major copper-working landscape in India, excavated by R.C. Agrawala and Vijay Kumar from 1977-1983. Over 400 copper objects (axes, chisels, fish-hooks, arrowheads, bangles) recovered from Ganeshwar village alone — the largest Chalcolithic copper hoard in South Asia. The surrounding Aravalli hills' Khetri Copper Belt (one of the largest copper ore deposits in India) was the resource base for the Ganeshwar-Jodhpura smelting industry. The Chalcolithic copper from Ganeshwar is thought to have been the primary source for the Harappan copper tool industry — Mohenjo-daro and Harappa copper artefacts match Ganeshwar's isotope signature. The culture ended c.2800 BCE as mature Harappan phase began.
- Function
- Authority & administration
- Tradition
- South Asian archaeology
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 27.180, 75.800
Connections (2)
- Trade routeAhar
The Ahar-Banas towns worked copper and the Ganeshwar-Jodhpura field in the Khetri belt is where a good deal of it came from — thousands of copper objects, and almost certainly the source of much of what the Harappan cities used as well. A Chalcolithic culture with no writing and no cities was supplying the metal for the ones that had both.
- AnalogueMes Aynak
Two copper landscapes whose archaeology is about the metal rather than beside it. Ganeshwar-Jodhpura in the Khetri belt of Rajasthan produced tens of thousands of copper objects from the fourth and third millennia and supplied the Harappan cities; Mes Aynak in Logar has smelting debris interleaved with Buddhist buildings from the Kushan period on. In both cases the settlement pattern follows the ore, and in both the modern mining industry has come back to the same deposits.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Ganeshwar”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
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