The Andaman & Nicobar
Islands have been inhabited for several thousand years, at the very least. The
earlier archaeological evidence yet documented goes back some 2,200 years;
however, the indications from genetic, cultural and linguistic isolation studies
point to habitation going back 30,000 – 60,000 years, well into the Middle
Palaeolithic. In the Andaman Islands, the various Andamanese people maintained
their separated existence through the vast majority of this time, diversifying
into distinct linguistic, cultural and territorial groups. By the 1850s when
they first came into sustained contact by outside groups, the indigenous people
of Andamans were: the Great Andamanese, who collectively represented at least
10 distinct sub groups and languages; the Jarawa: the jungle (or Rutland
Jarawa); the Onge; and the Sentinelese (the most isolated of all the groups).
The indigenous peoples of the Nicobars (unrelated to the Andamanese) have a
similarly isolated and lengthy association with the islands. There are two main
groups: the Nicobarese, or Nicobari living throughout many of the islands; and
the Shompen, restricted to the interior of Great Nicobar.