6. Indus Valley Civilization or Harappa Civilization

Geographical Context

• The Indus or the Harappan culture is older than the Chalcolithic cultures but was more developed than them.
• The Harappan culture covered parts of Punjab, Sindh, Baluchistan, Rajasthan, Gujarat and fringes of Western UP.
• The area formed a triangle and was bigger than ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. Although more than 250 sites are known but only 6 can be regarded as cities.
• These were Harappa in Punjab, Mohenjo-Daro in Sindh, Chanhu-Daro about 130 km south of Mohenjo-Daro, Lothal in Gujarat, Kalibangan in Northern Rajasthan and Banwali in Hissar district in Haryana.
• The later Harappan phase can be found in Rangpur and Rojdi in Kathiawar peninsula in Gujarat.

 

Town Planning and Structures

• The Harappan Culture was distinguished by its system of town-planning. Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro each had its own citadel, which was possibly occupied by each members of ruling class.
• Below the citadel lay a lower town containing brick houses arranged in a grid system, inhabited by common people. Roads cut across each other at right angles and the city was divided into so many blocks.
• The most important public place in Mohenjo-Daro seems to be the Great Bath, a large tank situated in citadel mound. It served ritual bathing for any religious ceremony in India.
• There were granaries almost in every city in the civilization and they were the largest structure in Mohenjo-Daro.
• The use of burnt bricks in the Harappan cities is remarkable, as only dried bricks were used in Egypt and burnt bricks were used in contemporary Mesopotamia.
• The drainage system of Mohenjo-Daro was very impressive with each and every house having its own courtyard and bathroom. The drains were covered by bricks and stone slabs and in street with manholes.
• The drainage system and the quality of domestic bathrooms and drains were remarkable as no other civilization paid so much attention to health and cleanliness as the Harappan.

 

Agriculture

• Today the area is comparatively rainless but history shows that it was fertile in ancient times. In the course of time the natural vegetation was destroyed by extension of agriculture, large-scale grazing and supply of fuel.
• The reason of fertility of the region was the annual inundation of the Indus River in which the Indus people sowed seeds of wheat and barley to feed not only themselves but also the town people.
• No hoe and ploughshare has been discovered but the furrows were discovered in Kalibangan and stone sickles were used for harvesting, but channel or canal irrigation seems to have been absent.
• The Indus people produced wheat, barley, peas, sesamum, mustard etc. But in Lothal by as early as 1800 B.C. The people used rice.
• Probably cereals were received as taxes from peasants and stored in granaries for the payment of wages as in Mesopotamia, they used barley.
• The Indus people were the earliest people to produce cotton that's why it was called sindon by the Greeks.

 

Domestication of Animals

• Oxen, buffaloes, goats, sheep and pigs were domesticated. Dogs and cats were regarded as pets. They kept asses and camels as beast of burden.
• Horse was not in regular use, though its remains have been discovered.
• The contemporary Sumerians in Mesopotamia also domesticated these animals but they didn't use domesticated elephants and produce rice as done by the Harappan people in Gujarat.

Technology and Crafts

• The Harappan culture belongs to the Bronze Age with copper brought from Khetri Mines, Rajasthan or may be Baluchistan and Tin from Afghanistan or from Hazaribagh, Bihar.
• They produced not only images and utensils but also various tools and weapons such as axes, saws, knives and spears. Weavers wove cloth of wool and cotton.
• Seal making and terracotta manufacture were also important crafts. They also made jewellery of silver, gold and precious stones with first 2 obtained from Afghanistan and last one from South India.
• They produced their own characteristic pottery, which was made glossy and shining.

 

Trade

• Since there was no currency, they probably carried their exchanges through barter, traded with neighbouring areas by boats and bullock carts and had links with Rajasthan, Afghanistan and Iran.
• The Mesopotamian records from 2350 B.C. Refer to trade relation with Meluha and also spoke of 2 intermediate trading stations called Dilmun and Makan.

 

Political Organisation

• There is no clear idea about the political organization of the Harappans as no temples have been found at the sites except the Great Bath
• There are some indications of the practice of fire cult at Lothal in Gujarat in later phase but no temples were used for this purpose.
• Perhaps the Harappan people were more concerned with commerce than with conquests and Harappa was possibly ruled by a class of merchants.

 

Religious Practices

• In Harappa numerous terracotta figurines of women have been found. The Harappans looked upon the earth as the goddess of fertility and worshipped her as Egyptian worshipped Nile Goddess Isis.
• In Egypt the daughters inherited the throne or property but we don't know about the nature of inheritance in Harappan society.

 

The Male Deity in the Indus Valley

• He is represented on a seal, has three heads and has horns sitting in a yogi posture, surrounded by an elephant, a tiger, a rhinoceros and a buffalo below his throne.
• The seal immediately recalls to our mind the traditional image of Pasupati Mahadeva.
• The Rig Veda speaks of the non-Aryan people who were phallus worshipper. The phallus worship which started in the days of Harappa came to be recognised as a respectable form of worship in Hindu society.

 

Tree and Animal Worship

• The people of the Indus region also worshipped trees and animals such as pipal and the humped bull.
• They also worshipped gods in the form of trees, animals and human beings, but the gods were not placed in temples as common in Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia.
• Amulets have been found in large numbers as they believed in ghosts and evil forces. The Atharva Veda contains many charms and spells and recommended amulets to ward off diseases and evil forces.

 

The Harappan Script

• The Harappans invented the art of writing like the people of ancient Mesopotamia but it has not been deciphered so far, so no one can judge their contribution to literature, nor can we say anything about their ideas and beliefs.

Weights and Measures

• The knowledge of script must have helped the recording of private property and the keeping of accounts.
• The urban people of Indus India needed and used weights and measures for trade and other transactions.
• They show that in weighing mostly 16 or its multiples were used.

 

Harappan Pottery

• They were great experts in the use of potter's wheel as numerous pots painted in various colours are found decorated with the designs of trees and circles and also some images of men.

 

Seals

• The greatest artistic creations of the Harappan culture are the seals which carry short inscriptions with pictures of one-horned bull, the buffalo, the tiger, the rhinoceros, the goat and the elephant.

 

Images

• Hey made beautiful images of metal.

 

Terracotta Figurines

• Many figurines made of fire-baked earthen clay known as terracotta either used as toys or objects of worship.
• The seals and images represented sophisticated works but the terracotta pieces represented unsophisticated artistic works.
• The first were used by members of upper classes, and the second by the common people. The Harappan cultures is poor in artistic works made of stone as found in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia.

 

Origin, Maturity and End

• The Harappan Culture existed between 2500 B.C. And 1750 B.C. And with mature phase lying between 2200 B.C. And 2000 B.C. But throughout its existence retained the same kind of tools, weapons and houses.
• Around 1750 B.C. The two important cities Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro disappeared but the Harappan culture at other sites faded out gradually and continued in its degenerate phase in Gujarat, Rajasthan and western UP.
• Certain elements distinguish it from contemporary cultures of Western Asia such as planned towns, streets, drainage pipes and cess pits and nor any Western people show such skill in the use of burnt bricks.
• They invented their own typical script which bears no resemblance to the Egyptian and Mesopotamian scripts.
• Although the Harappan culture was a bronze Age culture, they used bronze on a very limited scale and used stone implements and finally no contemporary culture spread over such wide area as they did.
• The disappearance of Harappan culture is attributed to the decreasing fertility on account of increasing salinity of the soil or a sudden subsidence or uplift of the land causing floods or some point out that their culture was destroyed by the Aryans.
• Although the Rig Vedic Aryans settled down mostly in the land of the Seven Rivers in which the Harappan culture once flourished, we have no evidence of any mass scale confrontation between the Harappans and the Aryans.