Ancient Indus Civilization Blog

This Late Harappan piece has a hole in the center that may have been used for a ritual purpose. This piece resembles the Pedestal Vessel. For more on death and burial, see Painted Burial Pottery. >

A variety of golden artifacts have been discovered. Here, we see a gold bead collection discovered at Harappa 2000-2001. Other artifacts include a Composite Tubular Gold Bead, a pair of Gold Foiled Beads, and Bell Shaped Gold Ornaments. For more information about gold and Indus culture, read Jonathan Mark Kenoyer's article Wealth and Socioeconomic Hierarchies of the Indus Valley Civilizations. >

Assorted shell inlay with intersecting-circle and womb motifs from Mohenjo-daro. For more, read Mark Kenoyer's article Shell Working Industries of the Indus Civilization: A Summary as well as his article Shell-working in the Indus Civilization. >

Carnelian and gold pendant or hair ornament found at Harappa. What else might it have been 4000 years ago? >

For those who once thought the so-called "Priest King" bust was not native to the ancient Indus Valley, here is a male head from Mohenjo-daro with similar features. The existence of this artifact raises doubt concerning the aforementioned theories concerning the Priest King. >

"The central ornament worn on the forehead of the famous 'priest-king' sculpture from Mohenjo-daro appears to represent an eye bead, possibly made of gold with steatite inlay in the center." J.M. Kenoyer >

The pre-Indus civilization or so-called Ravi phase around 3000 BCE at Harappa yielded hand-formed mudbricks. Here, we can see the bricks very obviously lack uniformity in size and shape. There is a remarkable difference between these bricks and those from later periods such as those seen in the Mohenjo-daro Well and Platform. Other artifacts from this period include Ravi Phase Jewelry and the Pedestal Vessel. >

Complete fragment of seal with the trident hand, from Richard Meadow: H98-3505/8347-105 Steatite seal, intaglio. White fired steatite with a white core. Red speckling on interior below glaze level, slightly speckled on surface. Grinding marks visible on surface. Fragment of writing and top of animal motif remain - 2 or 3 signs are partially visible and 1 sign is complete (~”N”). The man with a double-bun hair style may be holding a trident or simply raising his hand. The animal motif is probably a tiger because of the multiple strokes. Anthropomorphic sign and animal direction facing to le… >

The earliest evidence of textiles at Harappa goes back to about 3300 BCE, and is another suggestion of how important this product must have been to the later Indus economy. Additional information concerning Indus textiles can be found in New Evidence for Early Silk in the Indus Civilization and Mark Kenoyer's Ancient Textiles of the Indus Valley Region. See also Unique Coiled Copper-alloy Necklace for a post on silk. >