This deeply investigative article published in Walking with the Unicorn (2018) takes on some of the most unusual facts about ancient Indus seals to surmise about their function in the Indus polity as a whole. >
"Debt lurks in the shadow of reciprocity," is the wonderful starting sentence of this paper. Highly theoretical, it opens up important questions about seals in the ancient Indus and Mesopotamian civilizations and their role in the system of administrative control which helped integrate society at the dawn of urban civilization. >
This paper examines the nature of Indus seals and the different aspects of seal iconography and style in order to better understand their overall role in the Indus civilization. >
"The recognition of variation and diversity [in the ancient Indus civilization] has encouraged a gradual, though not universally accepted, shift toward the interpretation that certain categories of Indus material acted as ‘a veneer… overlying diverse local and regional cultural expressions'," write the authors. >
"Once considered in all their components, clay sealings can in fact be key objects for understanding several aspects of the socio-economic organisation of the Indus Civilization," writes the author of this important recent paper built on years of work and thinking about the unique Lothal sealing trove he has done so much to help us understand. >
A fascinating article from the mammoth Walking with the Unicorn book that delves into the brief, intense life of ancient Indus-inspired seals in Dilmun (Bahrain) around 2000 BCE. The authors use the unique and extensive evidence from this Gulf civilization to to draw some important inferences about… >
During the second half of the 3rd millennium BC, the Harappan Civilization covered an area of over one million square kilometers in South Asia, from the Afghan highlands to western India. Excavations at large urban sites like Harappa, Mohenjo-daro, and Dholavira, as well as at smaller production si… >
An exhibition being held in New York and Madison, Wisconsin, in 1998 on the representational art of the Indus Valley reveals a highly developed artistic tradition with many styles and techniques of production. >
There are at least 18 examples of a "human and tiger" motif in Indus glyptic art. This short paper by one of the most prolific writers on ancient Indus themes, the late Dr. Gregory Possehl, wonders how we might read this visual artifact. >
