PATTANAM

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Context

• In the village of Pattanam in central Kerala lies the only multicultural archaeological site on the southwestern coast of the Indian subcontinent.

About the site

• Often referred to as the ‘first emporium’ of the Indian Ocean, Muziris — of which Pattanam is part — is an example of the Greco-Roman classical age coming into direct contact with an ancient South Indian civilisation.

Society

• There is no evidence that institutionalised religion existed in ancient Pattanam.
• There was certainly no indication of the graded inequality embodied in the caste system that has characterised contemporary Kerala and most of the rest of India.
• There were rigorous cultural and commercial exchanges.
  • The excavations have unearthed over 45 lakh sherds; these include approximately 1.4 lakh belonging to the littoral regions of the Mediterranean, the River Nile, the Red Sea, the western and eastern Indian Oceans, and the South China Sea.
  • Recent findings include the seal of a sphinx, native to the ancient Greek city of Thebes.
• This wide span of locations confirms the existence of a thriving urban centre from the 5th century B.C. till the 5th century A.D., with its peak phase from 100 B.C. to A.D. 300.
• Pattanam society may have lived in harmony with nature, like several indigenous societies did.

No war and religion

• No idols of gods and goddesses, or the remains of grandiose places of worship have been found.
• This iron-age and post-iron-age site was also bereft of sophisticated weaponry.
  • This is in sharp contrast with some Pattanam-contemporary sites such as Berenike in Egypt and Khor Rori in Oman.

Burial

• The grave remains at the Pattanam site were confined to fragmentary skeleton remains.
• The burials were of a “secondary” nature, where the dead were cremated first and the osseous remains ceremoniously buried later.
• Large terracotta urn burials and a wide variety of stone monuments abound in the Periyar delta and basin regions, showing the ceremonious nature of the later burial practices.
• No artefact found indicates any religious customs.

Lineage

• The genotype results point to South Asian, West Asian, and Mediterranean lineages.
• People of widely differing backgrounds were buried the same way, strongly suggesting the prevalence of a secular ethos.

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