Project on comparative study of Mesopotamian civilization and harrapan civilization.
Answers
3
in 1898 (Possehl 1999: 55). Noetling also visited sites like Periano Ghundai (1897)
and Rana Ghundai (1898), made collections and published small reports. Sir Aurel
Stein (1904) visited Dabarkot, where he later conducted a small excavation in 1927.
The site of Kalibangan was described as an ancient site as early as 1829 as ‘Kali-bang’
by Lt. Col. Tod. Luigi Pio Tessitori again visited the site in April 1917, and undertook a
small excavation in 1918. Tessitori also calls Kalibangan ‘Kali Vangu’ and ‘Kali Banga’
(Luigi 1918-19: 22-23). D.R. Bhandarkar discovered the great site of Mohenjo-daro
in 1911-12, and described the ancient mound spreading over three-fourths of a mile,
and near whose western edge a tower rises to a height of nearly 70 feet from the
surrounding ground level. Later, R.D. Banerji visited the site in 1919-20 and gave a
vivid description of the site and its remains, describing it as an important site.
The arrival of Sir John Marshall as the Director General of ASI in 1902 revived interest
in the further investigation of the three reported seals which were preserved in the
British Museum at that time. Two assessments of the mound of Harappa were made,
the first one by Pandit Hira Nanda Sastri in 1909, and the second by Harold Hargreaves
in 1914. Later, the site of Harappa was put into excavation under Rai Bahadur Daya
Ram Sahni, the Superintending Archaeologist of the Northern Circle of ASI in the
winter of 1920-21. One of the earliest conclusions was that, ‘…the Harappa seals
and their curious pictographic legends belong to the pre-Mauryan epoch; and it is to
be remembered that the digging to date has pierced only the topmost levels’ (Possehl
1999: 59). R.D. Banerji started excavation at Mohenjo-daro almost simultaneously in
1921-22, and the discoveries made here were seen in the light of the material coming
from Harappa. By 1923-24, Banerji suggested that there was a definite relationship
in the material coming from both these sites. However, Marshall himself made the
final assessment in 1924 when he brought the materials from both Harappa and
Mohenjo-daro together and compared them directly. Marshall could deduce that the
finds of these sites belonged to the same stage of culture, were approximately of the
same age, and that they were totally distinct from anything previously known in India
(Marshall 1923-24: 48).
The findings were published in the Illustrated London News on 20 September 1924 and
were widely publicised. The news item drew the attention of scholars and immediately
Sayce responded by pointing out the similarities and close resemblance in some of the
objects of the Indus Valley with those of antiquities found from Mesopotamia (Sayce