Recently, UNESCO has announced its prestigious world heritage sites list. Many sites in India had got a chance to get enlisted on the list. One among them is Dholavira.
Why did Dholavira get the chance and how important is this place in our history and heritage???
Let's understand the history behind this heritage site.
Discovery
To understand the importance of this site we have to go almost 170 years backwards. It was in the 1850s when the British government had introduced Railways to India. there was a need for bricks to construct railway lines and many baked bricks had been excavated and used. In 1875 Alexander Cunningham, the first Director-General of Archeological Survey of India(also known as the father of Indian archaeology)had found a seal of obscure origin after brick robbers moved off the bricks from an important site. Mistakenly he had placed the seal in the wrong time frame of our history. Like many of our historians of that time, he also thought that Indian history is only of 6 th century BC old. But the entire story was changed in 1924 when John Marshall, after observing various seals found in these sites, announced that these seals belong to a far older civilization than what the historians think and that civilization was named after the first site where the seals were found i.e Harappan civilization (Indus Valley Civilization)
Area
The area of this civilization was much bigger than any other civilizations that existed during the same period such as Egypt and Mesopatomian civilizations. The borders of the civilization included Jammu in the north, Narmada in the south and from Makran coast of Baluchistan in the west to Meerut in the north-east. It formed a triangle with an area of almost 1,299,600 square kilometres.
Important sites
Harappa- West Punjab - Present-day Pakistan
Mohenjodaro- Sind - Present-day Pakistan
Kot Diji - Sind
Kalibangan - Rajasthan
Rupar - Punjab
Banwali - Haryana
Chanhudaro
Lothal, Surkotada, Dholavira - Present-day Gujarat
Coastal cities - Surkotada, Sutkagendor,Lothal
Origin & Evolution
Salient features
Town planning:
Most of the towns were divided into two parts, they are, the upper town or the citadel (acropolis), where only ruling class people lived and the lower town, where common people lived.
They had used burnt bricks for most of their constructions with standard ratios of measurements. This was a common feature found in the entire civilization.
They had followed a grid system in constructing their houses with underground drainage.
Important constructions:
Great bath - found in Mohejodaro - might be a ritual bathing site.
Granaries:
Great Granary- Mohenjodaro
6 granaries - Harappa
Economy:
Agriculture:
Ploughed field excavated at Kalibangan shows that they knew agriculture
Main crops - wheat and barley
other crops - Sesame, mustard and cotton
They were known to be the earliest producers of cotton
They knew only wooden ploughshare but not an iron one
Animals- Sheep, goat and buffalo were domesticated
hunted animals for food- Eg: Deer
Humped bulls- their favourite animal
Dogs- their pets
Industry:
Trade
Imports- Gold, copper, tin, several semi-precious stones
Exports - Agri- products, finished products
The Barter system was followed for trade
Weights and measures - For trade and transactions they used to follow standard weights and measures, they were 16 or multiples of 16.
Art
These people were very fond of handicrafts which can be observed from the artefacts that were found in the excavations.
Chanhudaro- Exclusive site for craft production
Nageshwar and Balakot- Coastal sites- Specialised site for the making of shell objects
Important findings - 1) Dancing Girl -Mohenjodaro, 2) 2 stone statues -back view of man and a dancer- Harappa, 3) Painted pottery - Lothal
Script
It has to be fully deciphered.
It is not an alphabetical but pictographic script
There were nearly 400-600 signs of them only 40 -60 were basic signs
Its unique feature is that this script was written from right to left in most of the seals found.
In some seals, the boustrophedon method was followed in which alternative lines were written in the reverse direction
Religion
Chief Male Deity- Pashupathi or Proto Shiva- Sitting posture, three faces and two horns surrounded with four animals ( elephant, tiger, rhino & buffalo) and with 2 deer at his feet
Chief Female Deity - Mother Goddess
Trees and animals were also worshipped. Animals like One-horned unicorns and humped bulls were worshipped as there were a number of seals with those images.
They used amulets which proves that they believed in ghosts and evil forces
Decline
There was no unanimous view supporting the decline of such an outstanding civilization. Historians have given various theories regarding their decline. Two such theories are discussed here.
Natural calamities- recurring floods, drying up of rivers, decreasing soil fertility due to excessive exploitation and occasional earthquakes
Aryan Invasion- No proper evidence proving this theory but it was mentioned in Rigveda about the destruction of forts
Other facts
Horse was not known to them
Elephant and Rhinos were well known
Pottery Wheel was in full use
Meluha was the ancient name given to Indus by Mesapatomian people
Social differences can be observed by studying the burials
There might be 3 classes of people - Rulers, scribes and craftsmen, they lived in the cities
Farmers and herdsmen used to live countryside
Polity- Possibly ruled by a class of merchants
You may find the explanation part of this topic in the following video link
https://youtu.be/HfG0N79cr2I
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