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 Industries of the Indus Civilization: A Summary

Shell Inlay
Jonathan Mark Kenoyer
Major species of marine mollusca used in the shell industry are discussed in detail and possible ancient shell source areas are identified. Variations in shell artifacts within and between various urban, rural and coastal sites are presented as evidence for specialized production, hierarchical internal trade networks and regional interaction spheres.

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.

Stone Beads in Oman during the 3rd to 2nd Millennia BCE. New Approaches to the Study of Trade and Technology

Jonathan Mark Kenoyer
"In this paper," write the authors, "we present the preliminary results of a long-term and multifaceted study of the role of craft specialists and traders who were present in ancient Magan during the 5th-1st millennia BCE (Table 1), with a specific focus on beads found at sites in modern Oman, and

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

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.

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