History of Andaman
For centuries, Andamans has been nick named as Kala Paani. So much so that people in the mainland often relate it to a punishment center (details are furnished later on the page). But truly, Andamans is much more than simply a cellular jail and sea beaches.
The Islands are located in the Bay of Bengal at a distance of more than 1200 Kms from the mainland. This Union Territory is stretched over an area of more than 700 Km. from north to south with 36 inhabited islands and is divided into two districts – Andaman to the North and Nicobar to the South. The two are separated by about 90 nm of sea – The Ten degrees Channel. These islands are the continuation of the Arakan Yoma mountain range which extends from Myanmar upto Achin Head of Indonesia. Andaman and Nicobar Islands comprise of 572 islands of which 32 are inhabited. Earlier, pre-Tsunami, 38 of them were inhabited but after the Tsunami, two islands viz., Trinket and Bambuka were evacuated. The islands have a coverage of evergreen tropical rain forests upto 86%! The modern history of Andaman and Nicobar Islands begins with the bringing of 200 mutineers of 1857 in January, 1958. The construction of the Cellular Jail (present National Memorial) began in 1896 and was completed in 1906. In the year 1789, they first discovered the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. But due to the natural calamities, they left the island by 1796. The second settlement was basically a penal settlement, taken up in 1858, after the First War of Independence, followed by the settlement of convicts, Moplas, some criminal tribes from Central and United Provinces, refugees from erstwhile East Pakistan, Burma and Sri Lanka as well as ex-servicemen. |
Mythologicaly, the name Andaman was presumed to be derived from Hanuman, who was known to the Malays as Handuman. The name Nicobar seems to be a corruption of the South Indian term ‘Nakkavaram’ (Land of the Naked) as indicated in the great Tanjore inscription of AD 1050.
No one has been able to answer the question, with any degree of accuracy as to how and when the primitive tribal groups came to Andamans. The study of kitchen-midden of the Andamanese settlements revealed that the Negritos were present at least 2000 years ago in the Great Andamans (Large main islands apart from North Sentinel Island and Little Andaman). For quite some time it was believed that the aborigines of the Andaman Islands were descendants of African slaves once shipwrecked while being carried on board a Portuguese ship. But most of the anthropologists have come to the firm conclusion that they are not Negros but Negritos. In 1952, Lidio Cipriani, an Italian anthropologist dug up a kitchen-midden in Goalpahal in Little Andaman Island. While digging he reached depth of about 4 Mtrs, from the top of the midden through refuse mixed with only a little earth, very easy to penetrate. Bones, shells and other objects emerged clean as if only recently rejected. The situation altered suddenly about one meter from the bottom, when the strata became hard and cemented with a mixture of ashes and earth. In this layer, the shells were calcified by exposure to fire, and so fragile they could only be recovered in broken pieces. This means that when they arrived, the Negrito has no pottery. |