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Possible Evidence of Pre-Columbian Transoceanic Voyages Based on Conventional LSC and AMS 14C Dating of Associated Charcoal and a Carbonized Seed of Custard Apple (Annona squamosa L.)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2016

Anil Kumar Pokharia ,
B Sekar ,
Jagannath Pal  and
Alka Srivastava
Anil Kumar Pokharia*
Affiliation:
Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, 53, University Road, Lucknow 226 007, India
B Sekar
Affiliation:
Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, 53, University Road, Lucknow 226 007, India
Jagannath Pal
Affiliation:
Department of AIH, Culture and Archaeology, Allahabad University, Allahabad 211 002, India
Alka Srivastava
Affiliation:
Department of Botany, Dayanand Girls (PG) College, Civil Lines, Kanpur 208 001, India
*
Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

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An attempt was made to trace the antiquity of custard apple in India on the basis of accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) and liquid scintillation counting (LSC) radiocarbon dates. Recently, seed remains of custard apple (Annona squamosa L.) in association with wood charcoals were encountered from the Neolithic archaeological site of Tokwa at the confluence of the Belan and Adwa rivers, Mirzapur District, in the Vidhyan Plateau region of north-central India. The wood charcoal sample was dated at the 14C laboratory of the Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany (BSIP), Lucknow, by conventional LSC 14C dating. The sample dated to 1740 cal BC (BS-2054). A seed sample of custard apple was dated by AMS at the Institute of Physics 14C laboratory, Bhubaneswar, India (3MV tandem Pelletron accelerator). Interestingly, the AMS date was given as 1520 cal BC (IOPAMS-10), showing a reasonable agreement with the LSC date carried out at BSIP. On botanical grounds, the custard apple is native to South America and the West Indies and was supposed to have been introduced in India by the Portuguese in the 16th century. The present 14C dates of the samples pushes back the antiquity of custard apple on Indian soil to the 2nd millennium BC, favoring a group of specialists proposing diverse arguments for Asian-American transoceanic contacts before the discovery of America by Columbus in AD 1492.

Type
Archaeology
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 51 , Issue 3 , 2009 , pp. 923 - 930
Copyright
Copyright © 2009 by the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

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