Hunter-Gatherers to Farmers

Neolithic communities increasingly practised cultivation, animal domestication, woodworking, and more settled ways of living. Polished stone axes and other tools were especially useful for clearing vegetation, working wood, and supporting farming activities. The change was gradual and varied by region, but it is strongly associated with food production and settlement. Paper currency, railways, and naval warfare belong to much later contexts.

Mehrgarh, in the north-western region of the subcontinent, preserves early evidence of plant cultivation, animal domestication, village life, and changing technologies. These remains help historians study the transition from hunting and gathering to food production and settled communities. It was not a Mauryan capital, Gupta temple, or Chola port; those alternatives belong to different historical settings and functions.

The preserved furrows at Kalibangan provide direct archaeological evidence that land in the settlement’s region was ploughed and cultivated. The pattern has also been discussed in relation to possible crop practices, but the safest conclusion is simply that agriculture was carried out there. A ploughed field is not evidence of maritime trade, gold coins, or a Buddhist stupa, which are separate kinds of evidence.

With farming and more settled communities, people needed containers for storing grain, water and prepared food. Pottery was useful for these purposes and often appears with evidence of village life, although not every Neolithic community used it in exactly the same way. Option A correctly connects pottery with storage and settled life.