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Chapter 05
Geological Studies
springs or early summer thaw, the sudden increase in melting at times caused catastrophic floods that may though exists for a short period of time, but can erode and transport enormous glacial debris downstream. Since such rivers carry large sediment load, which clogs their course, hence one may find multiple distributary channels in the periglacial areas (braided river course). Such rivers lack the power of erosion (removal of rock material) instead they trend to deposit the sediment along their course (aggradational type). We have observed that the two streams that originate from the eastern and western flanks of the Nandi Mountain (southern Kailash basin), flows as braided streams till they meet at the southern flank of the Nandi Mountain (Figure 1). From here onwards till the Serlung Gompa, it has deeply incised the glacial deposits suggesting that the river has capacity to erode and transport sediments down valley. Again the river becomes depositional type (aggradation) till it debouches into the Barkha plain at Darchen through a narrow gorge carved on crumpled and folded phyllite rocks. Based on these observations, it was inferred that little role played by the rivers (particularly after the retreat of the glaciers) by way of incising the glacial deposits only (Lateral moraines) in the southern Kailash basin. Sculptured Features Features like Shiv Ling, bull, lion, pyramid etc. have drawn the attention of the people in the recent times (Figure 6 and 7). It was Shri Bharat Hansraj Shah who based on his repeated observations made during many visits to Kailash-Mansarovar suggested that they appeared to have been carved by human beings. In fact in Jain scriptures these features have been mentioned. A detailed description was provided by Shri Bharat Shah in his article 'Ashtapad Model' published in Volume II. Needless to say, that these features look as if, someone has carved them with a chisel and hammer on the rocks around Kailash and Nandi Mountain. During his visit these features were inspected from maximum proximity in order to assess their morphology and ascertain the presence of old human settlements. Considering the high altitude and ruggedness of the terrain around Kailash and Nandi Mountain, the work was quite demanding and risky in the hostile high-altitude environment. As discussed above, majority of the structures were developed on Kailash conglomerate which contain boulders of varying shape and size. Further the conglomerate horizons are porous and fractured. Such rocks are rarely used by human beings for carving any features (a more firm statement can be made by an archaeologist in this regard). However, authors own experience of working in the Kashmir valley with archaeologists, has seen that during the Neolithic period (~7000 years ago) people living at Burzahoma site in Kashmir which lies close to the limestone dominated Himalayan flank, seldom used the easily available limestone in the vicinity as raw material for making tools. That is because limestone is soft and is susceptible to chemical and physical wear and tear. Hence, these people went all the way to the southern Pir Panjal Mountain (~150 km south of Burzahoma) and used fine grained hard and compact volcanic rocks (Basalt). People who use rocks to make sculptures know it better that hard, compact and fine grained rocks are better material to work with. Also, it would be difficult to work with a material that
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Geological investigation of rock sculptures...
