This volume, sub-titled A Morphological Study represents a significant contribution to the study of ancient Indian scripts and cultural connections. The extensive documentation and classification of Tamil Nadu graffiti alone constitutes a valuable scholarly resource.
Although not about the ancient Indus valley, this groundbreaking examination of ten ancient Mesopotamian cities is rich food for thought about how ancient Indus cities may have developed.
Peggy Mohan's Wanderers, Kings, Merchants: The Story of India through Its Languages offers a fascinating linguistic journey through Indian history, examining how migrations, conquests, and cultural exchanges have shaped the languages of the subcontinent.
There is a lot to like about this well-written and engaging set of reflections on ancient Indus life and culture. It does not hesitate to examine its biases: "much of our acceptance of the past is a function of the present," writes the author, and "what I present are not arguments . . . these are not free of my prejudices. So approach this book in the spirit of curiosity, not combat."
The best guess at what some Indus signs may have meant and sounded like, especially the sequence of fish signs, came in this very first book on the ancient script published by an employee of the Indian Educational Service in 1933.
An absorbing book that brings to the reader in most direct fashion the complexities of living in some of the world's first cities. Dr. Robert Arnott manages to collate the manifold existential challenges inhabitants would have faced and brought them all together for the first time in one place.
This book, at least 15 years in the making, is a major contribution to the study of the ancient Indus script, the product of diligent research and the careful collection of all known Indus inscriptions into a single database and two volume publication.
This, the second volume of a comprehensive catalog of Indus signs "lists all Indus inscriptions that are currently available and presents the temporal as well as spatial distribution of inscribed
This book brought a trove of new information to bear that is slowly making its way into Indus archaeology while its materials analysis techniques are becoming more prevalent and important.
An exceptional collection by a wide variety of archaeologists that speak to discoveries in the past decades in Central Asia and what they may imply for cultural development in the wider region, including the ancient Indus area.
A wide-ranging analysis of toys and their possible role in ancient Indus civilization through a close look at finds from Bagasra, Gujarat. Using social theory, microarchaeology, recent research in other civilizations, and a sophisticated approach to the question of "toys" in archaeology, the author offers one of the few deep dives into a kind of object that is found in great quantities across many ancient Indus sites.
This nearly 400 page illustrated volume by Dr. Amendra Nath from 2014 covers three seasons of excavations (1997-2000), and is "drawn on the lines of the Wheeler Committee Report-1965." As the start of a record about this extensive, important major ancient Indus site, it is invaluable.
Adi is an engaging children's story that covers the journey of a young boy, Adi, son of a copper merchant in Nausharo to Mohenjo-daro with his father sometime during the height of the ancient Indus civilization.
Once in a while a book – in this case a graphic novel – comes along that upends what one thinks can be done through a medium for a subject. This book by Nikhil Gulati – with the expert assistance of Dr. Jonathan Mark Kenoyer – is one of the moments.
This much-hyped book, a hefty 700 pages, tries to write a "new history of humanity" by undermining the standard preconception that there was some sort of inevitable march towards cities and states and
These lectures at the University of Madras in 1935 by the archaeologist K. N. Dikshit is a little known but well-written and surprisingly relevant summary of what was known about the ancient Indus civilization after the first 14 years of excavations.
"The indigenous seems to reside and grow deep within the colonial," writes the author (p. 86) of this book.
An excellent history of archeological inquiry in India, with special focus on the Indus civilization and how perspectives like Gordon Childe's and other outdated ideas helped shape inquiry and debate for a long time.
This volume explores multiple perceptions of Indian history and scholarship produced through archaeological fieldwork and related photography during the colonial period. The focus is on John Marshall, the man who really made the Archaeological Survey of India the formidable player it became in the reconstruction and preservation of Indian history. He announced and fostered the discovery of the ancient Indus civilization, even as the hard work on the ground was done by a handful of Indian archaeologists.
There are almost no concise, up-to-date accounts of the ancient Indus civilization, locating the latest facts and opinions within a larger intellectual context. Has the Indus script been deciphered? What can we say about the relationship of ancient Indus traditions and modern Hinduism? How did Indus society compare to contemporary Bronze Age Egypt and Mesopotamia? Why do so many questions remain open and so contentious?
