Museums

Visits to ancient Indus objects in museums on three continents.

Ram @ Guimet

"The abundance of animal figurines at the major [Indus] urban centers suggests that they were commonly used in household and public rituals," writes Mark Kenoyer (Ancient Cities, p. 118). "All major domestic and wild animals are represented by terracotta figurines, but only a few animals were made in stone or faience. Two fragmentary stone sculptures of a seated ram were recovered from excavations at Mohenjo-daro," he continues; one was a faience amulet with a hole drilled through it, and there was also a larger sandstone of a seated ram [Image 3]. Ernest Mackay too noted how "model animals

Mundigak at the Guimet, Paris

A brand new slide show has just been opened featuring objects from Mundigak, a little-known Bronze Age [c. 4000-2400 BCE] set of mounds in southern Afghanistan. The objects are now at the Guimet, the French National Museum of Asian Art in Paris. Their similarity to objects and motifs in the ancient Indus Valley is remarkable. Examples include the pipal leaf, a rat trap, the humped bull, a bird whistle and classic goblets the Mundigak excavators called "brandy balloons." There is even a stone sculpture which resembles the "priest-king." This 33 slide section Mundigak @ the Guimet is accompanied

Chanhu-daro in Boston

The Museum of Fine Arts (MoFA) in Boston, USA has the largest collection of Indus artifacts outside India and Pakistan. MoFA collaborated with the American School of Indic and Iranian Studies in 1935-36 to excavate Chanhu-daro in Sindh, Pakistan, then British India. This mysterious, small and sophisticated craft manufacturing town about 80 miles south of Mohenjo-daro was discovered by N. G. Majumdar in 1931. He and the leader of the Chanhu-daro excavations Ernest J.H.

Sumatran Ship Cloths

A recent exhibition of Sumatran (Indonesian) ceremonial hangings in cotton and silk from the 19th century at the De Young Museum in San Francisco made me wonder whether such textiles were also in vogue in another maritime culture, the ancient Indus, whose boats would not seem out of place in these examples.

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