Indus Valley Civilization
A third civilization larger than Egyptian and sumer larger in area
arose in the Indus River Valley far to the East, in the south Asia.
It reached its highest at about the time of Akakadians and
Babylonians empires between about 2500 BC and 1500 BC.
Three modern countries India, Pakistan and Bangladesh trace
their roots in Indus Valley Civilization.
These countries lie on the sub continent of south Asia, a larger
triangular-shaped landmass that juts into the Indian Ocean.
Less than a century ago, archeologists working in Indus Valley
civilization identified an Ancient civilization in south Asia.
They dated this civilization to about 2500 BC.
Centrally planned cities
The people in the Indus valley formed the earliest urban
civilization in the sub Indian continent and one of the earliest in
the world.
Archaeologists named the Indus valley civilization settlement
the Harappan civilization after of its major cities Harappa
located in present day Pakistan.
Mohenjo-Daro another important Harappan city lay near the
Arabian Sea.
The ruins of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro are outstanding
examples of urban planning.
A citadel or fortress, built on a brick platform overlooked each
city possibly serving as government and religious centre.
Below the citadel Harappan engineers skillfully laid out each
city in a grid pattern of straight streets crossing each other at
right angles.
They used oven-baked bricks to build houses with plat wooden
roofs, and some houses had at least one bathroom, with drains
and waterfall (chutes) connected to a brick sewer system beneath
the streets.
Harappan life
Most of the people worked in the land.
In the fields of Indus valley floodplain they grew wheat, barley,
rice, cotton.
Farmers planted at the beginning or end of the flood season and
relied on the drenched land to provide the necessary water for
their crops.
Supported by food surplus, inhabitants were engaged in industry
and commerce.
Some artisans worked bronze and copper into tools, while other
made silver vessels and gold, shell, and ivory and jewelry.
They also mass-produced clay pots and they spun and wove
cotton cloth.
Many pots, pans and cooking vessels have been found in the
ancient civilization of the Indus valley.
Each of them has had their own decorative, unique design, with
some of them just plain.
Most of the pots were made of terracotta but some of the ones
used for cooking were made of bronze.
They used fire to harden the terracotta pots.
Merchants who handled these goods used soapstone seals to
identify bundles of merchandise.
The discovery by archeologists of harappan seals into
Mesopotamia indicates that Indus valley traded with the people
of Mesopotamia as early as 2300 BC.
The first excavations that were made in the cities of Harappa and
Mohenjo-Daro which were conducted in 1920s.
Fish in the Indus River were caught by fish hooks and were
eaten with most probably bread.
They ate animals as well such as sheep, pigs, zebus (a kind of
cow) and water buffalo.
Harappa and Mohenjo-daro
Possibly served as twin capitals
Each city had a fortified citadel and a large granary
Broad streets, market places, temples, public buildings
Standardized weights, measures, architecture, bricks
Writing and Religion
They inscribed pictograms on the seals they placed on the
packages of goods.
Existed but has not been translated (some historians believe that
they people of Indus Valley made their pictograms after
adopting the idea of writing from the people of Mesopotamia.)
Many deities were feminine
Animal and humanlike figures suggest that the people of Indus
Valley worshiped gods associated with natural forces.
Decline
Harappan society had disappeared by 1500 B.C.
Historians have many theories for what caused the collapse of
this civilization such as;
natural dreadful conditions led to a subsistence crisis
Natural disaster - floods or earthquakes
Population began to abandon their cities
Evidence of warfare, invasion (In the Mohenjo-daro ruins are
signs that some of its people may have met a violent end,
possibly at the hands of invaders.
