Mohenjo-daro

The So-Called Stupa Mound at Mohenjo Daro and its Relationship with the Ancient Citadel

What was really going on at the so-called stupa mound in Mohenjo-daro? This important paper by Giovanni Verardi and Federica Barba challenges the long-standing interpretation of the so-called Stupa Mound at Mohenjo Daro, as a Buddhist stupa dating to the 2nd century AD.

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Mohenjo-daro and Interregional Connections in the Indus Civilization: Evidence from Inscribed Seals

Gregg M. Jamison

One way to understand the connections between ancient Indus sites, often separated by enormous distances, is to look ever more closely at some of their smallest artefacts – in this case unicorn seals, usually merely 5 cm square.

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On the Development of Indus Technical Virtuosity and Its Relation to Social Structure

Massimo Vidale

This paper focusses on "the distinctive Indus characteristic of inventing and diffusing elaborated techniques for the production of small, valuable objects, especially ornaments."

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Who Were the ‘Massacre Victims’ at Mohenjo-daro? A Craniometric Investigation

Brian E. Hemphill

This 40 page paper presents an in-depth analysis aiming to elucidate the biological affiliations of individuals found in atypical burial contexts at Mohenjo-daro through craniometric studies.

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Semantic scope of Indus inscriptions comprising taxation, trade and craft licensing, commodity control and access control: archaeological and script-internal evidence

Bahata Ansumali Mukhopadhyay

The author brings together a great deal of information to argue that "inscribed stamp-seals were primarily used for enforcing certain rules involving taxation, trade/craft control, commodity control and access control," and in relating stamp seals and tablets, that "such tablets were possibly trade/craft/commodity-specific licenses issued to tax-collectors, traders, and artisans," (p. 1).

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Painted Indus Script on Ceramics and Steatite: New Insights on Indus Script Calligraphy and Function

Jonathan Mark Kenoyer

A careful look at one of the least studied forms of Indus writing. "The painting of script on pottery. Painting script requires a specially prepared brush that could have been the same as that used for decorating pottery, but would have been selected to have the appropriate size and shape for the size of the script being painted."

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An Indus Scale

Sudeshna Guha

Chapter 5 from Sudeshna Guha's bestselling A History of India Through 75 Objects (2022), includes a little-known object described as a ‘measure of length’ by Ernest Mackay.

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Heterarchic Powers in the Ancient Indus Cities

Massimo Vidale

This thoughtful and enlightening paper starts with a clear statement of the writer's point-of-view: "On the other hand, to keep writing that Indus society in the 3rd millennium BC was uniform, acephalous, egalitarian and classless, that it was not a state, that its people rejected violence, elites

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Indus zoomorphism and its avatars

M. V. Bhaskar

A technical paper which rewards the follower with valuable insights and serves, on a platter as it were, some complex puzzles in Indus iconography for further cogitation to the reader.

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Diversity, variability, adaptation and ‘fragility’ in the Indus Civilization

Cameron A. Petrie

A superb framing of how we might think of the Indus civilization and its evolution as a larger entity in comparison and contrast with other ancient civilizations. How did Indus cities fit into a rural context? Were they ruled by elites? How did they manage to survive so long?

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