The inXuence of the European model in prehistoric archaeology
of colonial Asia and the PaciWcThe study of prehistoric archaeology in Asia was not independent of develop-
ments in Europe. On the contrary, the European model became hegemonic
for the description of prehistoric collections. The major periods dividing
European prehistory—still in debate at this time—were used as guiding
principles by those dealing with prehistoric antiquities elsewhere. Findings
made in Europe raised expectations as to what could be found in other
parts of the world. Learned individuals were generally aware of the main
publications of European prehistory and undertook research in the other
continents based on references in them. Examples of this can be found in
relation to the chronological division ofWnds, also in the study of megalithic
monuments, as well as in a topic developed in the following section, the
inXuence of race in the study of prehistoric remains. Regarding chronology,
the European sequence served as an essential basis for the classiWcation
of prehistoric material elsewhere. The discoveries of the Somme valley
in France (Chapter 12), for example, were a direct inspiration to Robert
Bruce Foote (1834–1912), a geologist who arrived in India to join the Indian
Geological Survey in 1858 and made hisWrst archaeological discoveries in
Madras in 1863. Throughout the next three decades his geological surveys
allowed him to detect over 450 sites in southern India and Gujarat,
which he identiWed as dating to the Palaeolithic, Neolithic, and Iron Age
(Paddayya 1995: 130–1). The European inXuence was also felt in Indochina,
where research on prehistoric material centred on the Neolithic and the
Bronze Age.
One clear example of how the European mould inXuenced the archaeology
of Asia and the PaciWc is that of the study of megaliths, as seen in India and
Australia, as well as in independent countries such as China. McNiven and
Russell (2005: ch. 4) have identiWed this as disassociation, a trope of European
colonialism. The identiWcation of monumental structures with other similar
ones in Europe led many scholars to the assumption of ultimate European
authorship, and therefore to the disassociation of the monuments from native
populations. There are many cases of the European inXuence in the classiWca-
tion of pre-contact monuments elsewhere. One of theWrst was Colonel
Meadows Taylor (1808–76) during his tenure as the Political Agent of the
British in the principality of Shorapur in North Karnataka in 1842–53. At the
time of the discoveries of megalithic monuments of Carnac (Brittany, France)
and England he found, mapped and excavated prehistoric sites such as
dolmens, cists and circles now known to be dated to the Iron Age (Paddayya
Archaeology of the Primitive 297