The two officers of Archaeological Survey of India, Daya Ram Sahni(Harappa) and Rakhal Das Banerjee(Mohenjo Daro) are credited with the Discovery of Indus Valley Civilization in 1921 and 1922 respectively. As we have already discussed in the previous post that Indus valley civilization was an urban civilization it was flourished in between 2500 B.C.-1500 B.C. This civilization was spread along the river Indus and its tributaries and the remains of the civilization has been found at Harappa(Pakistan), Mohenjo Daro(Pakistan), Kalibangan(Rajasthan), Alamgirpur(UP), Lothal(Gujarat), Rangpur(Gujarat), Dholavira(Gujarat) et-cetera.
As it was an urban civilization the cities were well planned, trading was well flourished, impressive buildings were build, the life of people seemed prosperous & it is found that they even had a vision towards religion.
Every city's division in three parts shows us the well planned system of Indus valley civilization.The 3 parts in which cities were divided are:
1. Citadel was an artificially raised hillock in the center of every city.
2. The Lower Part had the common people's houses.
3. The Outer Part was provided for the agricultural processes beyond the boundary walls.
Every was provided with a reservoir and granary for storage of surplus grain.
The people of Indus valley also concentrated on trade and commerce. The evidences have been found of the trading of Indus valley people with the other contemporary civilizations i.e., Mesopotamia* (lies in the major part of modern Iraq) and The Egyptian civilizations. Images of ships on seals depicts the trading by sea.
Indus valley people were not only good traders but also were great builders of that time. The Great Bath of Mohenjo Daro with the dimension of 12*7*2.4 metres, the Great Granary of Harappa had a dimension of 50*15.5 metres, and a structure at lothal resembling a dockyard shows extensive professionalism in the field of architecture in the contemporary world.
This all shows us the prosperous life of the people of Indus valley civilization, and the ruins of a large number of two storeyed houses, gold and silver ornaments, numerous toys of clay fulfills that.
A particular seal shows a male god like figure with three faces, two horns, surrounded by animals is a replica of Indian religious concept of Bhagwan Pashupati or Shiva Pashupati (the lord of animals).
There are many views on how the well flourished cities of Indus Valley declined abruptly. Some historians says it could be due to any natural calamity or the floods in the rivers has ended this ancient prosperous City. whatever the reason was, the only thing comes to our mind is that it was just the starting of what is going to call The 'History Of India'.
Mesopotamia* :- A greek word, Mesos means 'In between' & Potamus means 'rivers', a civilization in between two rivers Tigris and euphrates
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