HYDERABAD: It has once again been proven that the rocks of Hyderabad have been preserving human history for ages. In an interesting discovery, paintings belonging to the middle Stone Age (Mesolithic period), were found on a rock shelter on the outskirts of Hyderabad.
Two young trekkers, Mir Omar Ali Khan and Rishabh Manda of IBS first found some paintings on a rock at the top of a hillock at Manchirevula forest trek park on the outer-ring road in Hyderabad. They, along with a team of students led by MA Srinivasan, assistant professor in history at Potti Sriramulu Telugu University, visited the site last Saturday to study the rock art.
“This site has paintings of three tortoises, one fish and a geometric motif in red colour, belonging to the Mesolithic phase. The Mesolithic phase spans roughly between 10000 to 4,000 BC. It means the age of these paintings might be anywhere between 12,000 to 6,000 years old. The rock shelter on which these paintings were found is a suitable dwelling space of Mesolithic humans as the rock boulder is shaped as a snake hood.” says Srinivasan.
There are some more paintings on which these visible paintings seem to be superimposed. Some lines are faded too.“As we could find some broken pieces of quartzite used in making microliths, it is a clear Mesolithic site. Microliths are the stone tools made by the people of the Middle stone age. There might be some water sources nearby in that period which provided the people dwelling under this rock shelter, with tortoises and fish” Srinivasan opines.
Paintings of tortoises were found in the past at Sanganonipalli in Narayanpet district and Vattimalla in Rajanna-Sircilla belonging to the Mesolithic period. Altogether, Telangana has more than 75 rock art sites belonging to the Mesolithic to Megalithic periods.
Hyderabad has two more rock art sites, one at Kokapet which became extinct with the growth of real estate. The other one at Gundla Pochampally in Medchal Malkajgiri district, which is also facing the same fate as the Kokapet rock art site due to urbanisation.