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1. the Indus Valley Civilization

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1. the Indus Valley Civilization 1. The Indus Valley Civilization Preview What came to be called Hinduism was an amalgamation of beliefs and practices from several sources. This chapter focuses on the first of the two major contributors: the indus Valley Civilization. in subsequent chapters we will focus on the second: the indo-aryans. The discovery of the indus Valley Civilization in the nineteenth century revealed a sophisticated and long-forgotten ancient culture that appears to have contributed to the development of the hindu traditions. in this chapter, we examine the architectural ruins and artifacts left by this civilization and contemplate their import for its inhabitants and for subsequent hindu history. This examination reveals that indus Valley religion focused on maintaining ritual purity and appropriating divine powers to assist in reproduction and the maintenance of life. Finally, we introduce the indo-aryans with a brief discussion of their relationship to the dwellers of the indus Valley. Two major cultural streams contributed to was then northwestern India and is now Paki- the development of what later came to be stan stumbled upon the remains of an ancient called Hinduism. The first was an intriguing city known only to locals. The engineers were and sophisticated ancient culture known today only interested in the well-fired bricks from the as the Indus Valley Civilization. The second ruins, and they proceeded to quarry the city for source was a nomadic people called the Indo- that resource. It was not until the early twenti- Aryans, whom most scholars believe migrated eth century, as other similar sites were uncov- into India from Central Asia and bequeathed ered, that archaeologists appreciated the full to Hindus their most sacred texts and rituals. significance of this unwitting discovery. They In this and the next two chapters, we will study determined that the ancient city, now reduced each of these cultures and explore their respec- to railroad ballast, was part of a vast network of tive influences on the evolution of the Hindu villages and towns constituting an entire civili- Traditions (box 1.1). zation long forgotten by the rest of humanity. The discovery of this ancient culture, one of the most remarkable archaeological finds of modern The Indus Valley Civilization times, compelled scholars to revise their under- standing of the earliest history of India and has In the nineteenth century, British engineers in recent years sparked a heated debate about the searching for ballast for a railway line in what original inhabitants of the Indian Subcontinent. 15 16 The Indus Valley Civilization, so named as impressive as ancient Egypt and Sumeria. because many of its settlements were situated While many Hindus today do not regard the along the Indus River, turned out to be one of Indus Valley Civilization as part of their sacred the great cultures of the ancient world.1 What history, the evidence suggests that this culture arly Cultures has come to light since the first excavations contributed significantly to the grand complex e suggests that the Indus Valley Civilization was known to many as Hinduism. ndia’s ndia’s i — i Box 1.1 two viewS oF time Part a Hindu view of time i ons T Traditional hindus regard the passage of time as cyclical rather than linear. according to an ancient hindu cosmology developed after the Vedic era, the universe undergoes a series of four successive ages, or yugas, of varying lengths before it is destroyed and re-created. The world’s destruction at the end of the final yuga marks a new beginning, initiating a whole new cycle of yugas. This pattern has had no beginning and will indu T r ad i h have no end. The first period, known as the satya Yuga, is a golden age in which the gods maintain close T he relationships with human beings, who are naturally pious and live an average of a hundred thousand years. The later yugas—the Treta, dvapara, and Kali (the current period)—are characterized by the decline of human piety and morality and evinced by cruelty, discord, materialism, lust, and shorter life spans. according to a common method of reckoning, the four yugas make one Mahayuga, lasting for a period of 4,320,000 human years. one Mahayuga is a single day in the life of brahma, the creator god according to many traditions. a period of 360 brahma-days equals one brahma-year, and a brahma lives one hundred such years. Thus, a brahma lives 155,520,000,000,000 human years! the Periods of Hindu History although most hindus would not think of their history in a linear fashion, the following scheme is one way to view the stages of hindu history. 3300–1400 b.c.e. indus Valley Civilization 1600–800 b.c.e. Vedic Period 800–200 b.c.e. Classical Period (coincident with the axial age) 200 b.c.e.–500 c.e. epic and early Puranic Period 500–1500 c.e. Medieval and late Puranic Period 1500 c.e.–present Modern Period 17 What is known about the Indus Valley cul- fied as villages or towns. The largest and most ture comes exclusively from archaeological evi- important are cities known as Mohenjo-daro Chapter 1 dence, because its cryptic script has never been and Harappa. These names are post–Indus completely deciphered. We do not even know Civilization designations that refer to towns — what the citizens of this civilization called built much later on the ruins of the ancient The Indus Valley Civilization themselves. The archaeological data indicate urban centers. In their heyday, Mohenjo-daro that the Indus Valley culture was established and Harappa may have each hosted a popula- around 3300 b.c.e. and flourished between tion as large as forty to fifty thousand, which 2600 and 1900 b.c.e. Around 1900 b.c.e., it was immense by ancient standards. Harappa entered a period of decline and ultimately appears to have been the capital, and accord- disappeared around 1400 b.c.e. At its height, ingly the culture is sometimes referred to as the the Indus Valley Civilization covered most of Harappan Civilization. present-day Pakistan, the westernmost part of All of the Indus Valley municipalities were present-day India, and parts of Afghanistan, in highly organized and carefully planned, dis- an area estimated to include over five hundred playing remarkably similar features. The uni- thousand square miles (figure 1.1). Over fifteen formity of these cities suggests a centralized hundred Indus Valley sites throughout this authority and code enforcement, since many of region have been unearthed so far, and most the settlements were over fifty miles apart. The have yet to be fully excavated. Several hundred remains of buildings and the layout of the towns of these sites are large enough to be classi- indicate that their inhabitants prized order and 0 400 miles 0 400 km AFGHANISTAN Islamabad CHINA H IRAN Lahore i Harappa m a l R. PAKISTAN us a Ind NEPALy R. a Mohenjo-daro r s a Delhi g g a h G A r a b i a n Ahmadabad S e a INDIA Major Harappan sites Other archaeological sites Modern cities Mumbai Existing rivers Former rivers B a y o f Extent of Harappan civilization B e n g a l Fig. 1.1 The Indus Valley Civilization. The Indus Valley Civilization was spread throughout the northwestern part of the Indian Subcontinent in an area roughly the size of Texas. (Mapping Specialists.) AFP15 Map 1.1 Indus Valley Civilization Second proof 3/01/11 18 organization. But aside from the urban consis- Purity and Pollution tency that indicates central administration, we One of the most obvious and intriguing fea- know very little about the way Indus dwellers tures of the Indus cities is the evidence that governed themselves or structured their soci- points to an intense concern with cleanliness. arly Cultures ety. We also know little about their economy Private homes were furnished with sophisti- e except that village life focused on agriculture cated indoor bathing and toilet facilities that ndia’s ndia’s i and cattle herding and life in the larger cities were plumbed and lined with ceramic tiles in a — i centered on the production of arts and crafts. relatively modern way. The plumbing and sewer Part The discovery of Indus Valley artifacts as far systems were superior to those found in other away as Mesopotamia and Central Asia sug- cultures of the time and are in fact superior to i ons gests that trade played a significant role in the facilities found in many Indian and Pakistani T Harappan economy. homes today. Not only did individual homes Although the archaeological data do not feature advanced lavatories, but municipali- tell the complete story of this society, they do ties did as well. Mohenjo-daro and Harappa reveal enough for scholars to make informed each had a large central bath with public access indu T r ad i h judgments about its worldview and religious (figure 1.2). These public baths predate similar practices. Yet, since literary sources are unavail- facilities in ancient Rome by many centuries. T he able for corroboration, and because the arti- The ubiquity of the baths, their central loca- facts are often ambiguous, these judgments tions, and the care with which they were con- remain conjectures and are frequently debated structed all point to a deep preoccupation with by experts. We will consider the archaeological purity and cleanness. discoveries that appear to have religious import Almost certainly, this concern was more and attempt to comprehend what they tell us than a matter of bodily hygiene.
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