Seals

Seals and tablets with inscriptions from the ancient Indus Valley Civilization.

Seal with Two-Horned Zebu Bull

Courtesy of The Cleveland Museum of Art, J. H. Wade Fund 1973.160.
"At their best, it would be no exaggeration to describe them as little masterpieces of controlled realism, with a monumental strength in one sense out of all proportion to their size and in another entirely related to it," wrote Sir Mortimer Wheeler. Seal with Two-Horned Zebu Bull and Inscription, ca. 2000 BCE. As Mark Kenoyer writes "The majestic zebu bull, with its heavy dewlap and wide curving horns is perhaps the most impressive motif found on the Indus seals.

The Chimaera: Revisited

Further to the discussion of chimeras, among the first unicorn seals found by John Marshall at Mohenjo-daro in the 1920's was this one. He wrote: "The animal most often represented on the seals is the apparently single-horned beast ... There is a possibility, I think, that the artist intended to represent one horn behind the other. In other animals, however, the two horns are shown quite distinctly. In some respects the body of this beast, which is always a male, resembles that of an antelope of heavy build, such as the eland or oryx, and in others that of an ox.

Two Clay Sealings from Harappa

1. A clay sealing from the Harappa Phase levels (2600-1900 BCE) that may have come from a large bundle of goods shipped to the site from a distant region. The clay does not appear to be the same type of clay as found near Harappa and has the impression of two different seals. 2. A clay sealing from the Harappa Phase levels (2600-1900 BCE) that may have come from a large bundle of goods shipped to the site from a distant region. The clay does not appear to be the same type of clay as found near Harappa and has the impression of two different seals.

Long Indus Seals

Long rectangular seals with no animal motifs from the last part of the Harappan Phase (2200-1900 BCE) found at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro. "This type of seal is found with only abstract writing, which radically altered communication. Impressions made by the square seals carry two distinct messages, one is presented in a script that could only have been understood by a literate person and the other in the animal motif, that even a child could comprehend.

3 Harappan Phase Clay Seals

Three clay sealings from the Harappa Phase levels (2600-1900 BCE) that may have come from large bundles of goods shipped to the site from a distant region. The clay does not appear to be the same type of clay as found near Harappa and each sealing has the impression of two different seals.

Buffalo Seal with Figures

"On another seal, No. 510 [in Mackay], a buffalo appears to have attacked a number of people who are lying on the ground around him in every conceivable attitude," writes the excavator Ernest Mackay. "It is undoubtedly the wild rather than the domesticated species that is represented in on this seal, an altogether finer animal which stands 16 to 16.5 hands high at the shoulder. Unlike the domesticated variety, it is very truculent and when wounded is very savage; it was, therefore, a fitting vahana or vehicle for Yama, the god of death. "The little drama depicted on this seal may represent an

Back of a Seal

Ernest Mackay writes (1931): "The boss was then carefully rounded off after the groove that always runs across its center had been roughly made by a V-shaped cut. The rounding of the boss was apparently done with a knife and finished off with an abrasive, after which a hole was bored through it from opposite sides to take a cord." See also Seal with Two-Horned Zebu Bull.

Parpola's Indus Script Dictionary

The Indus script remains to be deciphered and we will probably never be sure until a bilingual text of some sort is found (not improbable). Until then, Asko Parpola's work on the fish sign is probably the closest to guarded approval by other major scholars. The initial insight into the fish/star connection in Dravidian languages was made by a Jesuit priest, Father Heras, in 1932. Dr. Parpola has been studying this undeciphered writing for over 40 years at the University of Helsinki in Finland and is co-editor of collections of all seals and inscriptions in India and Pakistan. More detail on

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