what is the sailent features of Indus valley civilization ?
Answers
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The area formed a triangle and accounted for about 1,299,600 square kilometers. Recent Carbon-14 dating indicate the period of the mature Harappan civilization to be from C.2,800/2,900-1,800 B.C. Modern research on the Harappan civiliation, establishing evidence of their contact with the Mesopotamian Civilization also corroborates this dating.
Town Planning: The most remarkable feature of the Harappan civilization was its urbanisation. Each city was divided into a citadel area where the essential institutions of Civil and religious life were located and the lower residential area where the urban population lived.
In Mohenjodaro and Harappa, the citadel was surrounded by a brick wall. At Kalibangan, both the citadel and the lower city were surrounded by a wall. Usually, towns or cities were laid out in a parallel grammas form. The use of baked and unbaked bricks of standard size shows that the brick making was a large scale industry for the Harappans.
In the citadel area, the Great Bath at Mohenjodaro is the most striking structure. It is assumed that it was meant for some elaborate ritual of vital importance for the people. To the west of the Great Bath there are the remains of a large granary. At Harappa remarkable number of granaries has also been found ranged in two rows of six, with a central passage.
In Mohenjoadro, to another side of the Great Bath, is a long building which has been identified as the residence of a very high official. Another significant building here is an assembly hall. The most significant discoveries at Kalibangan and Lothal are the fire altars.
The houses of varying sizes point towards the economic groups in the settlement. The parallel rows of two room cottages unearthed at Mohenjodaro and Harappa were perhaps used by the poorer sections of society, while the big houses, which had much the same plan- a square courtyard around which were a number of rooms – were used by the rich. The houses were equipped with private wells and toilets.
The bathrooms were connected by drains with sewers under the main street. The drainage system is one of the most impressive achievements of the Harappans and presupposes existence of some kind of municipal organisation. The houses were constructed with the kiln-made or Kuccha bricks, not stones. The bathrooms and drains were invariably built with pukka bricks made waterproof by adding gypsum.
Agriculture: The Harappans cultivated wheat and barley, peas and dates and also sesame and mustard which were used for oil. However, the people cultivated rice as early as 1,800 B.C. in Lothal. The Harappans were the earliest people to grow cotton. Irrigation depended on the irregular flooding of the rivers of Punjab and Sind.
Canal irrigation was not practised. The evidence of a furrowed field in Kalibangan indicates that the Harappans were using some sort of woodern plough. It has also suggested that the Harappan people used a toothed harrow.
Trade and Its Network: There was extensive inland and foreign trade. It has also been reasonably established that this trade might have been overland as well as maritime. It is proved by the occurrence of small terracotta boats, and above all, by the vast brick built dock at Lothal.
As there is a no evidence of coins, barter must have been the normal method of exchange of goods. But the system of weights and measures was excellent. For weighing goods – small as well as large – perfectly made cubes of agate were employed. The weights followed a binary system in the lower denominations: 1, 2, 4, 8 to 64 and then going to 160 and then in decimal multiples of 16, 320, 640, 1,600, 3,200 etc.
What they imported must have been goods locally unavailable such as copper (from South India, Baluchistan and Arabia), gold (South India, Afghanistan and Persia), Silver (Afghanistan and Iran), lapis lazuli (Badak-shan in north east Afghanistan) turquoise (Iran), Jade (Central Asia), amethyst (Maharashtra), agate, chalcedony and carnelian from Saurashtra and western India. Harappan seals and other small objects used by the merchants and traders for stamping their goods have been found in Mesopotamia.
Mesopotamian literature speaks of the merchants of Ur (in Mesopotamia) as carrying on trade with foreign countries. Among these the most frequently mentioned are Tilmun, Magan and Meluhha. Tilmun is most commonly identified with the island of Bahrein in the Persian Gulf-Magan may be Oman or some other port of South Arabia. Meluhha is now generally understood to mean India, especially the Indus region and Saurashtra.
The various occupations in which the people were engaged spanned a wide range – spinning and weaving of cotton and wool, pottery- making, bead-making and seal making metal working was highly skilled. They made fine jewellery in gold, bronze implements, copper beakers, saws, chisels and knives of different metals. Stone sculptures were rare and undeveloped. The Bearded Head in stone from Mohenjodaro is a well known piece of art.