Imagine being told you can see a tree that is around 200 million years old — without trekking into a dense forest or some remote corner of the country. It sounds unbelievable, yet it is entirely true. A living testimony to the Earth's history of hundreds of millions of years stands right in Patna, the capital of Bihar, and all you have to do to see it is walk into the Patna Museum.
Looks Like a Rock, Was Actually a Tree
The giant fossil tree preserved at the Patna Museum is a full 53 feet long. At first glance, almost anyone could mistake it for a large boulder or a slab of stone. The reality, however, is that hundreds of millions of years ago this was a living, breathing tree that slowly transformed into solid stone over time. That is exactly why visitors to the museum stop in front of it with special curiosity, eager to understand its story.
Far More Than an Old Tree
From a scientific point of view, this is no ordinary ancient tree. It is an important window into the Earth's prehistoric environment, the plant life of that era and its climate. Its presence places the Patna Museum among the select few sites in the country where a glimpse of natural history stretching back hundreds of millions of years is available right before your eyes.
Discovered in 1927 During Railway Work
The story of this rare heritage object begins in 1927. At that time, work was under way to lay a railway line in the Kumarpur area near Asansol in West Bengal. While digging, labourers came across a massive tree-like structure buried in the ground. It was initially taken to be ordinary wood, but when geologists examined it, it became clear that this was no common timber — it was a fossil hundreds of millions of years old. It was then preserved and recognised as a precious piece of heritage for further study.
A Pine-Family Tree From the Permian Period
According to scientists, this was a tree of the pine (chir) species, one that likely existed around 200 million years ago. Fragments of this fossil tree were recovered from the upper Raniganj layer of the lower Gondwana or Damuda mountain range, and it is said to date back to the Permian period. It is believed that some natural event caused the tree to fall into a river or a water body, after which it was rapidly buried under layers of mud and sediment.
How a Living Tree Turned to Stone
Once buried, the tree was cut off from oxygen. With no oxygen reaching it, the rotting and decay that would normally affect any piece of wood slowed down dramatically, which is why its original structure remained intact for so long. Over time, mineral-rich water kept seeping into the buried tree, and minerals such as silica gradually accumulated inside the wood's cells. During this process, which played out over millions of years, the organic matter of the wood was destroyed and minerals took its place. As a result, the entire tree turned into a stone-hard structure. This process is known as fossilisation or petrification. That is why the tree today looks like a piece of rock, yet its inner make-up still preserves the identity of a tree. All of this information is recorded at the Patna Museum.
