The Indus Valley Civilisation[1] (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation, was a Bronze Agecivilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900 BCE.[2][a] Together with ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, it was one of three early civilisations of the Near East and South Asia, and of the three, the most widespread, its sites spanning an area from much of Pakistan, to northeast Afghanistan, and northwestern India.[3][b] The civilisation flourished both in the alluvial plain of the Indus River, which flows through the length of Pakistan, and along a system of perennial monsoon-fed rivers that once coursed in the vicinity of the Ghaggar-Hakra, a seasonal river in northwest India and eastern Pakistan.[2][4]
The term Harappan is sometimes applied to the Indus civilisation after its type siteHarappa, the first to be excavated early in the 20th century in what was then the Punjab province of British India and is now Punjab, Pakistan.[5][c] The discovery of Harappa and soon afterwards Mohenjo-daro was the culmination of work that had begun after the founding of the Archaeological Survey of India in the British Raj in 1861.[6]
There were earlier and later cultures called Early Harappan and Late
Harappan in the same area. The early Harappan cultures were populated
from Neolithic cultures, the earliest and best-known of which is Mehrgarh, in Balochistan, Pakistan.[7][8] Harappan civilisation is sometimes called Mature Harappan to distinguish it from the earlier cultures.
Pre-Harappan era: Mehrgarh
Mehrgarh is a Neolithic (7000 BCE to c. 2500 BCE) mountain site in the Balochistan province of Pakistan,[76] which gave new insights on the emergence of the Indus Valley Civilisation.[64][w] Mehrgarh is one of the earliest sites with evidence of farming and herding in South Asia.[77][78] Mehrgarh was influenced by the Near Eastern Neolithic,[79]
with similarities between "domesticated wheat varieties, early phases
of farming, pottery, other archaeological artefacts, some domesticated
plants and herd animals."[80][x]
Jean-Francois Jarrige
argues for an independent origin of Mehrgarh. Jarrige notes "the
assumption that farming economy was introduced full-fledged from
Near-East to South Asia,"[81][x][y][z]
and the similarities between Neolithic sites from eastern Mesopotamia
and the western Indus valley, which are evidence of a "cultural
continuum" between those sites. But given the originality of Mehrgarh,
Jarrige concludes that Mehrgarh has an earlier local background, and is
not a "'backwater' of the Neolithic culture of the Near East".[81]
Lukacs and Hemphill suggest an initial local development of
Mehrgarh, with a continuity in cultural development but a change in
population. According to Lukacs and Hemphill, while there is a strong
continuity between the neolithic and chalcolithic
(Copper Age) cultures of Mehrgarh, dental evidence shows that the
chalcolithic population did not descend from the neolithic population of
Mehrgarh,[95] which "suggests moderate levels of gene flow."[95][aa]
Mascarenhas et al. (2015) note that "new, possibly West Asian, body
types are reported from the graves of Mehrgarh beginning in the Togau
phase (3800 BCE)."[96]
Gallego Romero et al. (2011) state that their research on lactose
tolerance in India suggests that "the west Eurasian genetic
contribution identified by Reich et al. (2009) principally reflects gene
flow from Iran and the Middle East."[97]
They further note that "[t]he earliest evidence of cattle herding in
south Asia comes from the Indus River Valley site of Mehrgarh and is
dated to 7,000 YBP."[97][ab]
Early Harappan
The Early Harappan Ravi Phase, named after the nearby Ravi River, lasted from c. 3300
BCE until 2800 BCE. It started when farmers from the mountains
gradually moved between their mountain homes and the lowland river
valleys,[99] and is related to the Hakra Phase, identified in the Ghaggar-Hakra River Valley to the west, and predates the Kot Diji Phase (2800–2600 BCE, Harappan 2), named after a site in northern Sindh, Pakistan, near Mohenjo-daro. The earliest examples of the Indus script date to the 3rd millennium BCE.[100][101]
The mature phase of earlier village cultures is represented by Rehman Dheri and Amri in Pakistan.[102]Kot Diji
represents the phase leading up to Mature Harappan, with the citadel
representing centralised authority and an increasingly urban quality of
life. Another town of this stage was found at Kalibangan in India on the Hakra River.[103]
Trade networks linked this culture with related regional cultures and distant sources of raw materials, including lapis lazuli and other materials for bead-making. By this time, villagers had domesticated numerous crops, including peas, sesame seeds, dates, and cotton, as well as animals, including the water buffalo.
Early Harappan communities turned to large urban centres by 2600 BCE,
from where the mature Harappan phase started. The latest research shows
that Indus Valley people migrated from villages to cities.[104][105]
The final stages of the Early Harappan period are characterised
by the building of large walled settlements, the expansion of trade
networks, and the increasing integration of regional communities into a
"relatively uniform" material culture in terms of pottery styles,
ornaments, and stamp seals with Indus script, leading into the transition to the Mature Harappan phase.[106]
Mature Harappan
Mature Harappan Period, c. 2600–1900 BCE
Mature Harappan
According to Giosan et al. (2012), the slow southward migration of
the monsoons across Asia initially allowed the Indus Valley villages to
develop by taming the floods of the Indus and its tributaries.
Flood-supported farming led to large agricultural surpluses, which in
turn supported the development of cities. The IVC residents did not
develop irrigation capabilities, relying mainly on the seasonal monsoons
leading to summer floods.[4]
Brooke further notes that the development of advanced cities coincides
with a reduction in rainfall, which may have triggered a reorganisation
into larger urban centres.[108][e]
According to J.G. Shaffer and D.A. Lichtenstein,[109]
the Mature Harappan civilisation was "a fusion of the Bagor, Hakra, and
Kot Diji traditions or 'ethnic groups' in the Ghaggar-Hakra valley on
the borders of India and Pakistan".[110]
Also, according to a more recent summary by Maisels (2003), "The Harappan oecumene formed from a Kot Dijian/Amri-Nal
synthesis". He also says that, in the development of complexity, the
site of Mohenjo-daro has priority, along with the Hakra-Ghaggar cluster
of sites, "where Hakra wares actually precede the Kot Diji related
material". He sees these areas as "catalytic in producing the fusion
from Hakra, Kot Dijian and Amri-Nal cultural elements that resulted in
the gestalt we recognize as Early Harappan (Early Indus)."[111]
By 2600 BCE, the Early Harappan communities turned into large urban centres. Such urban centres include Harappa, Ganeriwala, Mohenjo-daro in modern-day Pakistan, and Dholavira, Kalibangan, Rakhigarhi, Rupar, and Lothal in modern-day India.[112]
In total, more than 1,000 settlements have been found, mainly in the
general region of the Indus and Ghaggar-Hakra Rivers and their
tributaries.[13]
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