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INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION

The Indus Valley Civilization was one of the three earliest civilizations in the Old World, located along the Indus River valley in modern-day Pakistan and northwest India from 3300-1300 BCE. At its height, the civilization's cities like Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro had populations over 5 million and sophisticated urban planning with drainage and water supply systems. While its writing remains undeciphered, the civilization developed new crafts and trade. By 1800 BCE, the civilization began declining as its connections with other regions were lost and some cities were abandoned, possibly due to flooding of the Saraswati River. Around 1500 BCE, nomadic Aryan groups migrated into the region, introducing new languages and religious

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THE INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION
THE INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION The Indus Valley Civilization was a Bronze Age civilisation (3300–1300 BCE; mature period 2600–1900 BCE, pre-Harappan cultures starting c.7500 BCE) in northwest Indian subcontinent (including present day Pakistan, northwest India) and also in some regions in northeast Afghanistan.
RIVER INDUS AND SARASVATI Along with Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, it was one of three early civilisations of the Old World, and the most widespread among them, covering an area of 1.25 million sq km. It flourished in the basins of the Indus River, one of the major rivers of Asia, and the now dried up Sarasvati River.
URBAN PLANNING At its peak, the Indus Civilization may have had a population of more than 5 million. Inhabitants of the ancient Indus river valley developed new techniques in handicraft and metallurgy (copper, bronze, lead, and tin). The Indus cities are noted for their urban planning, baked brick houses, elaborate drainage systems, and water supply systems.
HARAPPA AND MOHENJO-DARO The Indus Valley Civilization is also known as the Harappan Civilization, after Harappa, the first of its sites to be excavated in the 1920s, in what was then the Punjab province of British India, and is now in Pakistan. The discovery of Harappa, and soon afterwards, Mohenjo-Daro, was the culmination of work beginning in 1861 with the founding of the Archaeological Survey of India in the British Raj.
THE CITY LIFE The evidence suggests they had a highly developed city life; many houses had wells and bathrooms as well as an elaborate underground drainage system. The social conditions of the citizens were comparable to those in Sumeria and superior to the contemporary Babylonians and Egyptians. These cities display a well-planned urbanization system.
WRITING The Indus Civilization had a writing system which today still remains a mystery: all attempts to decipher it have failed. This is one of the reasons why the Indus Valley Civilization is one of the least known of the important early civilizations of antiquity. Examples of this writing system have been found in pottery, amulets, carved stamp seals, and even in weights and copper tablets.
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CITIES Another point of debate is the nature of the relationship between these cities. Whether they were independent city-states or part of a larger kingdom is not entirely clear. Because the writing of the Indus people remains undeciphered and neither sculptures of rulers nor depictions of battles and military campaigns have been found, evidence pointing in either direction is not conclusive.
BEGINNING OF THE DECLINE By 1800 BCE, the Indus Valley Civilization saw the beginning of their decline: Writing started to disappear, standardized weights and measures used for trade and taxation purposes fell out of use, the connection with the Near East was interrupted, and some cities were gradually abandoned.
THE DECLINE The reasons for this decline are not entirely clear, but it is believed that the drying up of the Saraswati River, a process which had begun around 1900 BCE, was the main cause. Other experts speak of a great flood in the area. Either event would have had catastrophic effects on agricultural activity, making the economy no longer sustainable and breaking the civic order of the cities.
THE ARYANS Around 1500 BCE, a large group of nomadic cattle-herders, the Aryans, migrated into the region from central Asia. The Aryans crossed the Hindu Kush mountains and came in contact with the Indus Valley Civilization. This was a large migration and used to be seen as an invasion, which was thought to be the reason for the collapse of the Indus Valley Civilization, but this hypothesis is not unanimously accepted today.
THE AGRICULTURE Thus, the Indus Valley Civilization came to an end. Over the course of several centuries, the Aryans gradually settled down and took up agriculture. The language brought by the Aryans gained supremacy over the local languages: the origin of the most widely spoken languages today in south Asia goes back to the Aryans, who introduced the Indo-European languages into the Indian subcontinent.
THE SURVIVORS Other features of modern Indian society, such as religious practices and caste division, can also be traced back to the times of the Aryan migrations. Many pre-Aryan customs still survive in India today.