Articles on the evolution, growth and decline of urbanity and fluctuations or changes in over time within the ancient Harappan or Indus Valley Civilization and its antecedents.
One of the great civilizations of the ancient world -- that of the enigmatic people and cities of the Indus Valley -- grew from roots that reach deep into the past of Pakistan and India. >
The recent (Sept. 2019), 95 scientist, massive DNA study that shows how migrants into India from the west and north contributed to local DNA and which aligns with recent analyses on Indo-European languages coming into the subcontinent from the northwest as well. >
A provocative paper which claims that "the Indus civilization reveals that a ruling class is not a prerequisite for social complexity" (p. 1). The author, who is at Cambridge University where he has long been involved with the groundbreaking Two Rains project, starts with John Marshall and other ea… >
The case for Indus egalitarianism has rested on apparent absences: no palaces, no royal tombs, no exclusionary temples, no individual-aggrandizing art. Adam Green, who already argued in Killing the Priest-King that we should perhaps retire the assumption of Indus elites altogether, has long pushed … >
Archaeologically preserved symbols in the form of artifacts and architecture are the primary category of data available to scholars studying the development of early state level society in South Asia. >
A complex meta-analysis of data in a corner of northwestern India for what it can tell us about settlement patterns during the ancient Indus period and just after, when a host of factors, including possibly climate change, seem to have contributed to a re-allocation of populations between types of settlements. >
Another important and recent (October 2020) paper by Asko Parpola. He examines the 2018 finds from the Late Harappan site of Sanauli near Delhi in light of his research on early Indo-Aryan languages in the subcontinent and their origin in Central Asia. >
Recent discussions on the nature of early state societies have led some scholars to suggest that the early urban phenomenon of the Indus Civilization should not be characterized as a state level society. This paper will critically examine these arguments in the context of current studies of the Indus Civilization and recent excavations at Harappa, Pakistan. >
Science is slowly transforming ancient Indus studies, from DNA analysis of skeletons that point to migration and disease, to isotope analysis that reveals the distant origins of raw materials. One of the cleverest – and potentially rewarding i terms of increasing the number of ancient sites to investigate – must be the use of old maps. >
An important paper - given the painstaking analysis of data - which shows just how careful one has to be in attributing the demise of the Indus civilization to climate change. "A thorough accounting of how Indus peoples were impacted by—and may have adapted to—climatic fluctuations at the end of th… >
