Sankarjang

Sankarjang is an archaeological site near Angul in Odisha, once a settlement and a cemetery. In 1971 a shepherd came upon about 20 long, unfinished basalt bars and axes, chipped and ground, together with human remains and metal objects. The State Archaeology Department of Odisha followed up with a test excavation.

Ground stone tools like these are usually linked with the Neolithic, though they went on being made later, and the Sankarjang pieces resemble elaborate examples from eastern Asia and the South Seas. Many of the bars ring when struck. From their shape and traces of wear, Paul Yule and Bemmann tentatively identified them as finished and unfinished lithophones, which would make them the earliest known musical instrument in South Asia. The incisors of nine people buried here have a shovel shape, read as a sign of Mongolian affinities.