Trade

Articles on economics, monetary system, standardized weights and measurements, commerce, and trade of the ancient Indus Valley people and other nearby civilizations

Shell-Working in the Indus Civilization

Jonathan Mark Kenoyer

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. >

Chert Mines and Chert Miners. The Material Culture and Social Organization of the Indus Chipped Stone Workers, Artisans and Traders in the Indus Valley (Sindh, Pakistan)

Paolo Biagi

A very important recent exposition of one of the most important underlying elements – used to make fire, crucial items like weights and much else – of ancient Indus civilization and its connection to, in particular the Rohri Hills. >

Guabba, the Meluhhan Village in Mesopotamia

Petrus S. Vermaak

Until Dr. Vermaak's paper (2008), no one had connected the known existence of a Meluhhan village in the Girsu/Lagash area with Guabba; the availability of more texts since the first connections were made by scholars like Asko Parpola allowed him to both locate it more precisely and tease out a number of other references that give us some sense of what these people did and were known for. >

Socio-Economic Structures of the Indus Civilization as Reflected in Specialize Crafts and the Question of Ritual Segregation

Jonathan Mark Kenoyer

The author's research on the understanding of specialized crafts and the trade/exchange between rural and urban sites combined with his recent ethnoarchaeological studies has led him to question some of the generalizations that are prevalent about craft specialization and socio-economic organization of the Indus Civilization. >

The Indus Script and Economics. A Role for Indus Seals and Tablets in Rationing and Administration of Labor

Rajesh P. N. Rao

An insightful article that focusses on the clues in a seal and set of sixteen tablets found together at Harappa in 1997 to proffer that they may have been economic tokens. >

Forgotten Islands of the Past: The Archaeology of the Northern Coast of the Arabian Sea

Paolo Biagi

The author, who has been working in the larger region for decades exploring the long history of human habitation and industry going back tens of thousands of years, turns his attention to the geographic changes in the Indus delta region through the Bronze Age and what recent work shows us were the curious "islands" that once existed in lower Sindh (Dholavira, in Gujarat, is another example of such a later settlement). >

Shell Trade and Shell Working During the Neolithic and Early Chalcolithic at Mehrgarh, Pakistan

Jonathan Mark Kenoyer

AIthough the presence of a specialized shell industry and the widespread use of shell are well documented at sites of the Indus Civilization (2500-1750 B.C.), the early stages of this industry were not known until recent excavations at the site of Mehrgarh, Pakistan. >

Fish Symbolism and Fish Remains in Ancient South Asia

William R. Belcher

"Fish remains from archaeological sites have the capacity to offer a tremendous amount of information on social issues in addition to the more traditional goals of subsistence studies related to procurement strategies and seasonality," writes the author. >

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. >

Trade and Technology of the Indus Valley

Jonathan Mark Kenoyer

Selected results of current research on specialized crafts at the early urban center of Harappa, Pakistan. Many crafts such as shell working, ceramics, and agate and glazed steatite bead making are represented form the earliest levels of the site and continue up to the final phase of prehistoric occupation. >