Although shell objects may seem relatively insignificant compared to other categories of objects, such as seals or sculpture, a detailed study of shell objects and shell working has revealed important aspects of trade and craft specialization in the Indus Civilization. >
A discussion of some of the approaches meta-issues that arise when investigating raw materials, their locations and histories of their exploitation and how these can be interpreted. Particular attention is paid to carnelian and the history of possible sources in Gujarat. The point of the article is… >
A report on the largest archaeological site in South Asia, an industrial-scale enterprise that goes back hundreds of thousands of years: flint mining. >
Recent observations of artisans in Peshawar, Pakistan suggest that some techniques for making beads and other ornaments from lapis lazuli have not changed over the millennia. >
"Lazurite - the constituent of lapis lazuli that gives the rock its blue color - is a rare mineral in nature," writes Randall Law, and there is likely to have been only one source in the region during ancient times, the Badakhshan mines in Afghanistan. >
Steatite (soapstone) artifacts have been found at nearly every excavated Harappan period (2600-1900 BC) site and were the primary element used to make seals. >
Jean-Francois Jarrige (1940-2014) and his wife Catherine (b. 1942) were two of the most important archaeologists in the South Asian region, whose excavations at Mehrgarh, the site in Balochistan which predates the ancient Indus civilization by thousands of years, helped determine how far back the development of various traditions found in that and other regional civilizations actually reached. >
In November 2000 the authors conducted collaborative fieldwork to identify salt and mineral resources from the Salt Range in the Punjab, Pakistan used by the prehistoric site of Harappa over 200 kilometers away. >
