One
Of The Latest
Indus Valley Cities
Reveals A Marvel Of
Town Planning
Nearly
5,000 years ago, a well-developed civilization, commonly known as
the Indus Valley Civilization, prospered in what is today Northern
India and Pakistan. The vast civilization covers a territory the
size of Texasa quarter-million square miles. Over 1,400 cities,
towns and settlements have been found so far, with about 900 in
India. “For 700 years,” writes David Kamansky, Executive Director
and Senior Curator of the Pacific Asia Museum, “this sophisticated,
orderly and stable civilization dominated the region and traded
with the rest of the ancient world. Unlike the Egyptian and Mesopotamian
cultures, the Indus civilization gave primacy to its ordinary citizens.”
The most famous cities in the area include Harappa, Mohenjo Daro
and Ganweriwala in Pakistan, and Rakhigarhi and now Dholavira in
India. According to National Geographic, Dholavira is “India’s most
spectacular Indus civilization site” and one of the most recently
discovered cities of the region. Dholavira is located 30 miles south
of the Pakistan-India border and is under constant military patrol.
Abysmal relations between the countries prevent Indian and Pakistani
archeologists from visiting each other’s sites or even meeting,
except at international conferences. The government of Pakistan
does not adequately support archeological efforts on its side, nor
does it protect important sites. A renowned UNESCO archeologist,
H.J. Plenderleath, stated, “If nothing is done to preserve the remains
of Mohenjo Daro in Pakistan, all existing excavations will crumble
within the next 20 to 30 years, and one of the most striking monuments
of the dawn of civilization will be lost forever.”
Dholavira
is a desert most of the year, with huge salt flats periodically
flooded by the nearby Arabian Sea. “Maybe salt was a commodity
they sold,” said R.S. Bisht of the Archaeological Survey of India,
who is the chief investigator at Dholavira. Salt may have been
a reason for the city’s location, and in ancient times it may
have had a channel to the sea. Unlike other Indus cities, it does
not lay along a major river.
Covering
over 250 acres, Dholavira was a well-planned city designed to
collect precious fresh water during the monsoon season. It was
built on a sloping terrain between two seasonal storm-water channels
with dams and channels to direct the water into huge reservoirs.
One is 23 feet deep and 260 long and carved out of solid rock.
Additional channels provided essential year-round water to all
residents. Like Mohenjo Daro, the city had an advanced covered
sewer system and indoor baths. The town had two stadiums, one
of which is probably the world’s oldest and biggest, at 1,000
feet by 160 feet. It was likely used as a modern-day religious
mela place for games as well as social and religious events. Also
found on the central “citadel’s” northern gate was possibly the
world’s first sign. It contained ten undeciphered characters,
each 13 inches high.
Archeologists
found the undisturbed soil floor forty feet down, on which a fortified
town was built, obviously by settlers who came with experience
and knowledge of a planned settlement. The base of the outer walls
was 33 feet wide at places, later widened and heightened until
it was 42 feet wide and 32 feet high as a trading center developed.
Dholavirans regularly traded with Mesopotamians 1,500 miles to
the northeast. Buildings were made from millions of uniform bricks
in a standard ratio of 1:2:4. What appears to be an administration
center was built, then an open-air theatre and large residential
areas. The advanced level of administration is demonstrated by
the rapid repair of extensive damage caused by a large earthquake.
By the end of what is known as “stage four,” the town was at its
peak, and according to Bisht, divided with the Rig Veda’s trimeshthin
system of town planning into three areas, upper, middle and lower.
The innermost building is a “citadel” where Bisht believes the
ruler lived, the middle town had spacious houses, and the lower
town had densely packed houses. All the expansion to this point
was carried out along systematic lines. About 22,000 artifacts
were found including 73 microbeads of gold, so small that scientists
wonder how they could have been rounded so perfectly and drilled.
There was exquisite pottery, clay figurines and animals, beads
of lapis lazuli, silver and shell, as well as the usual weights
and seals.
About
2100-1900 bce, the Indus civilization as a whole began to decline
as the Saraswati River dried up. This is reflected in stage five
of Dholavira when a decline becomes evident. Encroachments appear
in previously well-organized areas of town, building standards
fall, and eventually the site is abandoned. Dholavira shows no
signs of succumbing to foreign invasion, and provides good evidence
that natural forces led to its decline, not a supposed “Aryan
Invasion” of outsiders. National Geographic’s June, 2000, article
on the Indus Civilization significantly states, “Early archaeologists
concluded that the end of the Indus civilization came at the hands
of invaders sweeping down from Central Asia. Today, archaeologists
point out that no weapons or other evidence of an attack were
found at Mohenjo Daro. Many archeologists doubt that there was
an invasion. Examination of skeletons has failed to show that
the original people were supplanted by newcomers with different
characteristics.” Time magazine also agrees, saying, “Early 20th
century theories that a more technologically advanced army poured
through the Hindu Kush passes and laid waste to the Harappan civilization
are largely discredited these days.” Other theories of their demise
include the disruption of trade with war-torn Mesopotamia and
an increasingly arid environment, too harsh for even Dholavira’s
advanced water system.
Top
|