A look at the early civilizations of India

In the Beginning… India’s Early Civilizations

Began in the Indus River Valley around 3000 B.C.E. and lasted until 1500 B.C.E.

There were more than 1,000 villages and towns that stretched from the Himalayas to the Arabian Sea.

The two that are the best excavated sites are . . .

Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa

The Indus Valley civilization was entirely unknown until 1921 C.E., when excavations in India and what would become Pakistan revealed the cities of Harappa and MohenjoDaro.

Mohenjo-Daro and HarappaThese cities had 35,000

people and a fortress to

watch over its residents.

They built both wide and

narrow streets. These

were used to make

neighborhoods, similar

to the neighborhoods we

have now.

Mohenjo Daro

Mohenjo Daro or "Mound of the Dead" is an ancient Indus Valley Civilization city that flourished between 2600 and 1900 B.C.E. It was one of the first cities in the world.

Home Sweet Home Houses had flat roofs and were made out of

mud bricks. The flat roofs helped them to dry their crops, when needed.

This is a little

model of what a

home would have

looked like – no

complete homes

are

still in existence.

Click on Pic -- Notice how Mohenjo Daro is laid out, and how their

homes looked (reconstruction based on archaeological evidence).

Well Planned Cities Mohenjo-Daro was an extremely well-planned city that

was similar in design to Harappa in the north. Both cities were approximately 3 miles in diameter, laid out in a grid-like formation, and were built primarily of burnt and unfired mud bricks.

These things weren’t the only indicators that the city was well planned . . .

Wells supplied water

Latrine They had indoor

plumbing!

Mohenjo-Daro's "chief glory" was a complex system of drains that ran throughout the city.

Drain Channels – with cap stones

Drains

The cap stones that could be removed to clean the drains.

According to one scholar, "only the Romans, more than two thousand years later, had a comparable drainage system." Clay pipes carried dirty, used water from buildings on the citadel and homes in the lower city to the main sewer system that ran along the city streets. The water and other sewage was emptied into the Indus River.

Food StorageResidents built granaries to store food for

the population of the entire city.

More evidence of city planning . . . Each city in the Indus Valley was surrounded by

massive walls and gateways. The walls were built to control trade and also to stop the city from being flooded.

Each part of the city was made up of walled sections. Each section included different buildings such as: Public buildings, houses, markets, and craft workshops.

The “Great Bath”

Do you see the

“Great Bath” in

this birds-eye

view?

Do you

see the

well?

What was its purpose? The people of Mohenjo-Daro used the bath for

hygienic purposes, and some archeologists theorize that the Great Bath might have also been used in religious rituals.

To support this theory, archeologists point to the baths of later Hindu temples and the bathing rituals that remain an important part of modern Hinduism.

More of the Drainage System of the City

The “Citadel” – highest point in the city.

Writing Symbols have been found on clay squares, but it has yet to be

determined what these were for. They may have been used for everyday writing, agricultural markers, or for individual names.

Other writing was found on walls . . .

Religion

They were polytheistic.

Most of their deities were

Female.

What did they look like?

This bust of a bearded man is one of the most famous artifacts recovered from the ruins in Mohenjo Daro.

He is believed to have been a priest or a nobleman.

It is called the “Priest-

King” statue.

They started trading their goods with Mesopotamia around 2300 B.C.E.

They had uniform weights and measurements – the same as in Mesopotamia!

Harappan EconomyWhat do you think these items are?

These are weights of various sizes and a scale. These weights were discovered near a large building located on the citadel, just south and west of the Great Bath.

This building, which is made of mud bricks and measures 150 feet long and 75 feet wide, is referred to as the Granary. Archeologists have also found bits of grain, such as wheat and barley, in the building ruins. This has led some of them to speculate that the building was used to store grain and also to house workers who crushed the grain into flour for trade.

Because of the presence of the weights, archeologists have speculated that merchants weighted their grain and used it like money to buy and sell goods.

The Granary

They had copper

and bronze tools

and weapons.

Children may have played with toy-like terra-cotta shapes, along with other small

clay figures of humans and animals that have been found at the Mohenjo-Daro site.

Toys like this indicate that there were full-sized carts like these.

Archeologists believe these figures show how farm goods were transported from the

fields outside of Mohenjo-Daro to the city market. These goods probably included

wheat, barley, cotton, rice, melons, peas, sesame seeds, and dates.

They liked to look nice!

Lapiz Lazuli and other precious metals and stones show evidence of trade with other regions.

“The Dancing Girl”statue found in Mohenjo Daro

This picture shows dice, carved pawns, balls carved of stone, and clay tracks. Archeologists have unearthed various artifacts at Mohenjo-Daro that they speculate were used to play games. Their findings include dice; solid stone boards; and small, carved "pawns" that they speculate might have been used to play an ancient form of chess.

Collapse of the CivilizationThese civilizations may have collapsed about 1500 B.C.

due to . . .

Theory I

. . . the cities being damaged by earthquakes and floods. Evidence shows that it WAS destroyed and rebuilt as many as 7 times because of flooding.

Theory II

. . . the Indus River changed its course, and the lack

of fresh water caused the people to leave.

Much of these cities still remain underground

And excavations are ongoing.

There’s much more to know! Spreading over an area of almost 600 acres, only 10

percent (50 acres) of Mohenjo Daro’s total area has been excavated so far.