INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION....(fully unearthed .....!!!

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The Harappa Culture/Indus Valley Civilization 1. The Civilization was named Indus Valley Civilization by Sir John Marshal(1924), after its discovery by Daya Ram Sahni and Vatsa in 1921-22. However, Indus Valley Civilization is not limited to areas around Harappa or those lying in the Indus valley alone.

2. The maximum number of sites were explored by S.R. Rao, in Gujarat (190 sites). At present there are over 350 sites which have been excavated.

3. Modern technique of carbon-14 dating has been employed to calculate the date of the Indus Valley Civilization. Harappan seals, which have been obtained from Mesopotamia provide additional help.

4. The population was heterogeneous, and at Mohenjodaro four races have been discovered. The people were not of Dravidian origin. The population was mostly belonged to the mediterranean race.

5. Indus Valley Civilization people had contacts with West Asia and Central Asia. Their contacts are proved by the discovery of terracota figures of the mother goddess, bull seals, etc in West and Central Asia. Their weights and measures resemble those ofBabylon. Their drainage system resembles that at Tell Asmar.

6. The largest Indus Valley Civilization site is Mohenjodaro. The smallest site is Allahdino. The largest sites in India are Dholavira, Rakhigarhi. The three nucleus sites are Mohenjodaro, Harappa,Dholavira. The number of sites which are considered as cities are six.

7. Mohenjodaro is located on the banks of Indus river. Chanhudaro is located on Indus/Sutlej; Harappa on Ravi; Kalibangan on Ghaggar/Saraswati; Lothal onBhogavo; and Ropar on Sutlej.

8. Important Harappan sites, year of discovery and discoverer Harappan sites (a Harappa ) Year of Discoverer discove ry 1921 D.R. Sahni and M.S. Vatsa (under Sir John Marshal)

(b Mohenjodaro1922 ) (c Chanhudaro 1925 ) (d Kalibangan 1953 ) (e Kot Diji 1955 ) (f) Lothal 1957 (g ) (h ) (i) (j) (k ) Suktagender 1962 Surkatoda Banawali Dholavira Ropar 1964

R.D. Banerjee Earnest Mackey/Majumdar A.N. Ghosh Fazal Ahmad M.S. Vatsa/S.R. Rao George Dales J.P. Joshi

1973 R.S. Bisht 1967/91 Joshi/Bisht 1953 Talwar and Bisht

9. The same type of layout, with a separate acropolis and lower city is found at Mohenjodaro, Harappa and Kalibangan.

10. The citadel and the lower city are joined at Surkatoda and Banawali. 11. The citadel was normally smaller than the lower city and lay to its West side. 12. Three divisions of town were discovered at Dholavira. 13. The town which shows marked differences in its town planning and drainage system from other Indus Valley Civilization sites is Banawali. 14. The town which resembles European castles (due to stone masonry) is Dholavira.

15. The Indus Valley Civilization site where houses are built just next to the wall is Desalpur. 16. Stone rubble has been used at Kalibangan. 17. The site of Mohenjodaro was constructed at least seven times.

18. The towns which resemble castles of merchants are Desalpur, Rojdi, Balakot. 19. The coastal towns are: Lothal, Surkatoda, Balakot, Allahdino and Rangpur. 20. The shape of citadel at Lothal is trapezium. 21. The houses were constructed on the pattern of gridiron (chess). 22. Fire altars have been discovered at Kalibangan. 23. Stupa, great bath, college, Hammam, granary and assembly hall belong to Mohenjodaro. 24. The cemetery R37, containing 57 burials, is located at Harappa. 25. Lothal is famous for warehouse, granary, merchants house, besides its warehouse. 26. The only site where guard rooms were provided at gates is Dholavira. 27. A ceramic bath tub was discovered at Balakot. 28. The major seal producing units were at Chanhudaro.

29. A huge palace-like building has been found at Banawali. 30. Bead-makers shop and equipments were found at Chanhudaro and Lothal. 31. Maximum number of seals have been found in Mohendojaro (57%). Second maximum at Harappa (36%). 32. Persian-gulf seal was found at Lothalit is a button seal.

ANCIENT LOTHAL

33. A Tiger seal was found at Banawali. 34. Iraqi cylindrical seal was found at Mohenjodaro. 35. A crucible for making bronze articles was discovered at Harappa. 36. Maximum bronze figures have been found in Mohenjodaro.

37. The Bronze dancing girl was found in Mohenjodaro. 38. Mostly limestone was used for sculptures.

39. Limestone sculpture of a seated male priest was found at Mohenjodaro. 40. An atta chakki (grinding stone) was discovered at Lothal.

41. Deluxe pottery was discovered at Banawali. 42. The only place where pottery depicting humans has been found is in Harrappa. 43. Pottery inkpots and writing tablets (leafs) were found at Chanhudaro. 44. War-tools made of copper and bronze were discovered at Mohenjodaro. 45. The site where oxen driven carts were found was Harappa. 46. A terracota model of a ship was found at Lothal. 47. A seat latrine has been found at Mohenjodaro. 48. A house floor containing the design of intersecting circles was found at Kalibangan. 49. The seals depicting the lord Pasupati Siva, Sumerian Gilgamesh and his two lions were found at Mohenjodaro. 50. Agricultural implements were found in Mohenjodaro. 51. Ploughed field were found in Kalibangan. 52. Jowar (Jau) was found in Banawali.

53.Cotton spindles, (and sewing needles) have been found in Mohenjodaro. 54. Rice husk was discovered in Lothal and Rangpur. 55. The foreign site where Indus Valley Civilization cotton cloth has been discoveredis Sumer. 56. Indus Valley Civilization people disposed of the dead bodies in three forms. At Mohenjodaro, we find three forms of burials:

(a) Complete burialwhole body buried along with the grave goods. (b) Fractional burialonly bones (after exposure to beasts, birds, etc.) were buried along with goods.

(c) Cremation burialsbody was cremated in urns and then buried under house floors or streets. 57. Four pot burials containing bone ashes were discovered at Surkatoda.

58. Bodies were found buried in oval pits at Ropar. 59. Important measurements: _ Great Bath: 12 m x 7 m x 2.4 m. _ Hammam/Granary:46 m x 23 m.

_ Collegiate building: 10 m square court. _ Cubical bricks:10 x 20 x 40 cm3. _ Average brick size: 5.5 x 12.5 x 26 cm.

_ Ratio of length, breadth and height of bricks: 4 :2: 1.

_ Larger bricks to cover drains: 51 cm (+). _ Stone weights used for trade were in the denominations of: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, ..... 160 and decimal multiples of 16. Eg. 16, 320, 6400, 8000, 12800, etc. _ Length was generally measured in: Foot (37.6 cm) and cubit (52 cm approx). _ Granary at Lothal: 214 x 36 x 4.5 m. _ Harappan storehouse: 50 m x 40 m, with a 7 m central passage. 60. The interesting evidences about the horse during Indus Valley Civilization are: _ Horse bones have been found in Surkatoda. _ Horse tooth has been found in Ranaghudai.

_ Terracota figure of a horse has been found in Lothal. _ Ashes of a horse have been found in Suktagendor. 61. Seals mostly depict the humpless bull (unicorn).

62. 75% terracota figures are of the humped bull. 63. The Garuda is depicted on a seal from Harappa. 64. Evidence of the rhinoceros comes from Amri and Kalibangan. It also tells us that there was plenty of rainfall there. 65. The Sumerian Gilgamesh seal also shows two tigers. 66. Some other known animals were bull, dog, rabbit and bird.

67. Though lot of buildings and bricks were found, no brick kilns have been found so far. 68. The customary vessels for drinking were goblets with pointed bases, which were used only once. 69. The most extensively used metal in Indus Valley Civilization was pure copper (unalloyed copper). 70. The metal which made earliest appearance during the Indus Valley Civilization was Silver. 71. The Indus Valley Civilization forts were not meant for defence from enemies. They were mere entry points and provided safety from petty robbers. They also stood as a symbol of social authority on an area. 72. The best information on social life comes from the terracota figures. 73. The weapons used were: axes, bows, arrows and the Gada. No defensive weapons have beenfound here. No swords were discovered. They are considered to be overall a peaceloving race.

74. Houses never opened towards the main roads. They opened towards the galis. Exception is houses found in Lothal. 75. The Indus Valley Civilization was probably ruled by the merchant class. 76. Mostly all cities had a citadel or Acropolise. It stood on a high mound, was called upper city and was fortified. Chanhudaro had no citadel. 77. The greatest work of art, of Indus Valley Civilization are the seals. They were mostly rectangular or square and were made from steatite. 78. The crossing point of the First street and East street of Mohenjodaro has been named Oxford Circus. 79. The various minerals (metals) used by Indus Valley Civilization people and their sources are:
Major Imports by the Harappans Materi Source al Gold Silver Afghanistan, Persia, Karnataka Afghanistan, Iran

Copper Baluchistan and Khetri(Rajasthan) Tin Afghanistan, Central Asia Rajasthan, South India, Afghanistan, Iran Copper seals from Lothal and Desalpur Central Asia Agates Western India Lead Coins Jade

Iron was not known to Indus Valley Civilization people. 80. Though pottery has been discovered, no potters wheel has been found (probably because it was wooden and hence perished). 81. The first mention of the possibility of the Harappan civilization was made as early as 1826, by Charles Masen. 82. Sindon is the Greek word for cotton and it was grown earliest in the Indus Valley Civilization period only. 83. The Mesopotamian king, whose date is known with certainty (2,350 B.C.), who claimed that ships from Indus Valley Civilization traded with him was King Sargon of Akkad. 84. In Dholavira (Rann of Kutch, Gujarat) Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has found

elaborate stone gateways with rounded columns, apart from giant reservoirs for water. A board inlaid with large Harappan script charactersprobably the worlds first hoarding was also found here. 85. In recent times, archaeologists have excavated or are in the process of digging up 90 other sites, both in India and Pakistan,that are throwing up remarkable clues about this great prehistoric civilisation. Among them are: Indus Valley was probably the largest prehistoric urban civilisation. The empire was ruled much like a democracy and the Indus people were the worlds top exporters. And, instead of the Aryans it was possibly a massive earthquake that did them in. 86. As per latest estimates, Indus Valley Civilization encompassed a staggering 1.5 million sq kman area larger than Western Europe. In size, it dwarfed contemporary civilisations in the Nile Valley in Egypt and in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys in Sumer (modern Iraq). Its geographical boundaries are now believed to extend up to the Iranian border on the west, Turkmenistan and Kashmir in the north, Delhi in the east and the Godavari Valley in the south.

87. While Mohenjodaro and Harappa are rightly regarded as principal cities of Indus Valley Civilization, there were several others, such as Rakhigarhi in Haryana and Ganweriwala i n Pakistans Punjab province, that match them both in size and importance. 88. Along with the Etruscan of Italy, the Indus Valley script is the last script of the Bronze Age that is yet to be deciphered. So far no such bilingual artefact has been found that could help break the Indus writing code. 89. The Indus Valley civilizations inscriptions are usually short, made up of 26 characters written usually in one line. The script, largely glyptic in content, has around 419 signs. The writing system is believed to be based on syllables. The Indus people also wrote from right to left(Boustrophedon), as is manifest by the strokes.

90. The excavation of Lothal, an Indus port town located off the Gujarat coast, shattered

notions that the Civilization was landlocked and isolated. A 700 ft long dock-even bigger than the ones in many present day portshas been discovered. It took an estimated million bricks to build. Hundreds of seals were found, some showing Persian Gulf origin, indicating that Lothal was a major port of exit and entry. 91. A lapis lazuli bead factory, discovered in Shortugai in Afghanistan, is believed to have been a major supplier to Harappan traders. 92. Harappans are credited with being the earliest growers of rice and cotton. 93. Outside the Indus system a few sites occur on the Makran Coast (Pakistan-Iran border), the westernmost of which is at SutkagenDor, near the modern frontier with Iran. These sites were probably ports or trading posts, supporting the sea trade with the Persian Gulf, and were established in what otherwise remained a largely separate cultural region. The uplands of Baluchistan, while showing clear evidence of trade and contact with the Indus Civilization, appear to have remained outside the direct Harappan rule.

94. East of the Indus system, toward the north, a number of sites occur right up to the edge of the Himalayan foothills, where at Alamgirpur, east of Delhi, the easternmost Harappan (or perhaps late Harappan) settlement has been discovered and partly excavated. 95. Besides Mohenjodaro and Harrapa, other major sites excavated includeDholavira and Surkotada in the Rann of Kach; Nausharo Firoz in Baluchistan;Shortughai in northern Afghanistan; Amri, Chanhu-daro, and Judeirjodaro in Sindh (Pakistan); and Sandhanawala in Bahawalpur (Pakistan). 96. Of all the Indus Valley Civilization sites, Harappa, Mohenjo-daro, Kalibangan and Lothal have been most extensively excavated. 97. At major three sites excavated, the citadel mound is on a north-south axis and about twice as long as it is broad. The lower city is laid out in a grid pattern of streets; at Kalibangan these were of regularly controlled widths, with the major streets running through, while the minor lanes were sometimes offset, creating different sizes of blocks. At all three sites the citadel was protected by a massive, defensive wall of brick,

which at Kalibangan was strengthened at intervals by square or rectangular bastions. In all three cases the city was situated near a river, although in modern times the rivers have deserted their former courses. 98. The most common building material at every site was brick, but the proportions of burned brick to unburned mud brick vary. Mohenjo-daro employs burned brick, perhaps because timber was more readily available, while mud brick was reserved for fillings and mass work. Kalibangan, on the other hand, reserved burned brick for bathrooms, wells, and drains. Most of the domestic architecture at Kalibangan was in mud brick.

99. The bathrooms of houses made during the time were usually indicated by the fine quality of the brickwork in the floor and by waste drains.

100. There is surprisingly little evidence of public places of worship, although at Mohenjodaro a number of possible temples were unearthed in the lower city, and other buildings of a ritual character were reported in the citadel. 101. Decline of Indus Valley:
Decline of Indus Valley Theorists Gorden Childe, Stuart Piggot H.T.Lambrick K.U.R.Kenedy R. Mprtimer Wheeler Robert Raikes Sood and Aggarwal Walter Fairservis Reasons of decline External Aggression Unstable river system Natural calamity Aryan invasion Earthquake Dryness of river Ecological imbalance

Orell Stein and A.N. Ghosh Climate change

102. Towns Associated with different industries:

Town Associated with Different Industries Levan Stone tools factory

Sukar Lothal Balakot

Stone tools factory Stone tools factory Factory for metallic finished goods Factory for pearl finished goods, Bangle's factory

Beads Factory Chanhuda Pearl finished goods factory ro Metallic finished goods factory Bangle's factory 103.

Evidence from Chief Sites Cemetery H & R-37 Prepared Garments Lower fortified town Port town Evidence of Rice Coffin Burial Horse Bone Fire Altar Temple like palace Horse's Tooth Pashuptai Seal Goddesses Harappa Mohenjodaro Kalibangan Lothal Lothal, Rangpur Harappa Surkotada Kalibangan & Lothal Mohenjodaro Rana Ghundai Mohenjodaro Mohenjodaro

Copper Rhino Copper Chariot Copper Elephant Granery Bronze Female Dancer Granery outside fort Beads Factory Copper ox Bangles Factory Graveyard Phallur Worship Bronze Bufallo Evidence of Earthquake Evidence of Plough Copper dog Camel's Bone Canals Woodenn Drainage

Diamabad Diamabad Diamabad Mohenjodaro & Harappa Mohenjodaro Harappa Chanhudaro, Balakot Kalibangan Chanhudaro, Balakot Harappa, Lothal Harappa Diamabad Kalibangan Kalibangan Lothal Kalibangan Malavan Kalibangan

Stone Covered Grave Surkotada

104. Sites at a glance:

Name of Year of Excavators Region/River Features

Sites

Excavati on 1. City followed grid planning 2. Row of six granaries Montgomery 3. Only place having district of Punjab (Now in evidences of coffin burial Pak) on the left4. Evidence of bank of Ravi fractional burial and coffin burial 5. Cemetery-H of alien people. 1. City followed grid planning 2. A large granary and Great Bath, a college 3. Human skeletons Larkana district in Sind showing invasiona and massacre. on the right bank of 4. Evidence of Horse Indus(Now in come from superficial Pak) level. 5. A piece of woven cotton alongwith spindle whorls and needles 6. Town was flooded more then seven times. 1. The city has no citadal 2. Famous for bead makers shop 3. A small pot, Situtated in possibly an inkpot Sind on the bank of Indus 4. Foot prints of a dog chasing a cat 5. Three different cultural layers, Indus,Jhukar and Jhangar Situated in Rajasthan on the Bank of 1. Shows both Pre Harappan and Harappan phase

Harappa

1921

Daya Ram Sahni

Mohenjodaro

1922

R.D.Banarjee

Chanhudaro

1931

N. Gopal Majumdar, Mackey

Kalibanga 1953 n

A. Ghosh

Ghaggar

2. Evidence of furrowed land 3. Evidence of seven fire altars and camel bones 4. Many houses had their own well 5. Kalibangan stand for black bangles 6. Evidence of wooden furrow

Lothal

1953

S.R. Rao

1. A titled floor which bears intersecting design of circles 2. Remains of rice husk 3. Evidence of horse Situated in from a terracotta figurine Gujarat on Bhogava river 4. A ship designed on near Gulf of a seal Cambay 5. Beads & trade ports 6. An instrument for measuring angles,pointing to modern day compass 1. Shows both PreHarappan and Harppan Situated in Hissar district phase of Haryana 2. Good quantity of barley found here Situated in Kutch (Bhuj) district of Gujarat 1. Bones of horses, Bead making shops

Banwali

1974

R.S. Bisht

Surkotada 1964

J.P. Joshi

Sutkagen 1927 dor

Stein, R.L.

1. Trade point between Harappa and Situated in Baluchistan on Babylon, belong to mature phase Dast River 2. Evidence of horse Situated in Sind on the 1. Evidence of antelope

Amri

1935

N.G. Majumdar

bank of Indus 1. Seven cultural stages 2. Largest site Situated in Gujarat in 3. Three party of Rann of Kutch city 4. Unique water management 1. Rice was cultivated 1. Wheel made painted pottery 2. Traces of defensive wall and well aligned streets 3. Knowledge of metallurgy, artistic toys etc

Dholavira 1985-90

R.S. Bisht

Rangpur

1953

Situated on M.S. Vats, B.B. Lal the bank of & S.R. Rao Mahar in Gujarat

Kot Diji

1953

Fazal Ahmed

Situated on the bank of Indus

Ropar

1953

Y.D. Sharma

1. Evidence of burying a dog below the human bural 2. One example of Situated in rectangular mudbrick Punjab of the chamber was noticed banks of Sutlej 3. Five fold cultures - Harappan, PGW, NBP, Kushana - Gupta and Medieval 1. Remain of pre Harappan and Harappan civilisation 2. The mounds rise to the height of about 9.7mts and are spread 2.8 sq hectare of area 1. The impression of cloth on a trough is discovered 2. Usually considered to be the

Balakot

1963-76

George F Dales

Situated on the Arabian Sea

Alamgirpu 1958 r

Y.D. Sharma

Situated on Hindon in Ghaziabad

eastern boundary of the

Indus culture

25 Feb 2013