A group of local history enthusiasts under the aegis of Dhanya Library and Sports Club in the village of Alattuchira, near Perumbavoor, have recently stumbled upon stone tools, utensils, remnants of temples and idols and urns from areas close to the banks of the Periyar that they believe dates back to the Stone Age.
President of the library, M.P. Prakash, who has been part of the team hunting for evidence for a book on local history since late 2013, said that these recent discoveries had infused fresh enthusiasm among the local people who were now keen to write an authentic history of Alattuchira, its people and culture.
The same group, in their first explorations in 2013, discovered stone tools and remnants from what appeared to be small-scale iron smelting units.
At that time, some of the stone tools were unearthed from the Kaprikkadu teak plantation under the Malayattoor Forest Division.
Though the quest for writing the history of their village took off with a convention of the local people and was confined to putting together a museum of local history, these new discoveries are prompting the people to expand the scope of their enquiries, said Mr. Prakash. Perumbavoor MLA Saju Paul has already contributed Rs. 5 lakh towards setting up the museum for these artefacts, he added.
He said that the recent explorations included places along the Periyar like Mundanthuruthu and Puliyanippara.
Parts of clay idols were discovered during recent excavation works for rennovation of Mulamkuzhi Devi Temple, situated about a kilometre away from the northern banks of the Periyar. Remnants of a temple were discovered from the Kottappara forest area.
Experts from the department of archaeology and historian M.G.S. Narayanan were among those who visited the area to take a first look at these remains from the past.
