Prehistoric Culture of Madurai Region

The present work on "Prehistoric Culture of Madurai Region" by Dr Pon. Ganesan is the outcome of his serious research in the School of Historical Studies of the Madurai Kamaraj University when Prof. S. Manickam was co-ordinator of the School. The learned scholar is more today but it is a fitting contribution to his scholarship that had the privilege of taking is D. Phil. in the Heidelberg University under the guidance of the distinguished historian Prof. Dietmar Rothermund.

The School of Historical Studies in the Madurai Kamaraj University has three wings on ancient, medieval and modern. None of the scholars have worked on archaeology in the Department of Ancient History when compared with the Universities of Madras, Nagpur (under Prof. Ajay Mitra Sastri) and those in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka. Their professors in the early times (1980s and 1990s) were N. Subrahmanian and K.R. Hanumanthan and later came a person called Thangavelu. Excepting N. Subrahmanian, having his base in ancient and medieval Tamil literature, the other two worked on modern history. Strange as the university system went they were appointed professors of Ancient History. The present author chose to work in an area that was alien to the department, but under his own will power and persistence has successfully completed a work on an archaeological subject.

Even since the foundation of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) and the pioneering works done by Sir John Marshall, the ASI has rendered yeoman service to bring to the historical limelight by its excavations and publications. Explorations proceeded in two directions, viz., underground (e.g. the Indic culture) and those ruins that remained on the surface of earth (e.g. Säñchi). Now underground archaeology is there.

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