Iron in Tamil Nadu 4200 years ago

Subject: History

Section: Art and culture

Context: Carbon dating of excavated finds in Tamil Nadu pushes evidence of iron being used in India back to 4,200 years ago.

Findings of the excavation:

Excavation site: The excavations are from Mayiladumparai near Krishnagiri in Tamil Nadu. Mayiladumparai is an important site with cultural material dating back between the Microlithic (30,000 BCE) and Early Historic (600 BCE) ages.
Carbon dating of excavated finds in Tamil Nadu pushes evidence of iron being used in India back to 4,200 years ago.
Before this, the earliest evidence of iron use was from 1900-2000 BCE for the country and from 1500 BCE for Tamil Nadu. The latest evidence dates the findings from Tamil Nadu to 2172 BCE.

Historical significance

Iron is not known to have been used in the Indus Valley, from where the use of copper in India is said to have originated (1500 BCE). But non-availability of copper for technological and mass exploitation forced other regions to remain in the Stone Age.
When iron technology was invented, it led to the production of agricultural tools and weapons, leading to production required for a civilisation ahead of economic and cultural progress.
While useful tools were made out of copper, these were brittle and not as strong as iron tools would be. It would have been difficult to use copper tools to clear dense forests and bring land under agriculture, which is why scientists infer that deforestation took place only after humans began using iron.
With the latest evidence tracing our Iron Age to 2000 BCE from 1500 BC, it can be assumed that TN cultural seeds were laid in 2000 BCE.
And the benefit of socio-economic changes and massive production triggered by the iron technology gave its first fruit around 600 BCE, the Tamil Brahmi scripts.
Tamil Brahmi scripts were once believed to have originated around 300 BCE, until a landmark finding in 2019 pushed the date back to 600 BCE. This dating narrowed the gap between the Indus Valley civilisation and Tamilagam/South India’s Sangam Age.