How did the ‘great god’ get a ‘blue neck’?
A remarkable bilingual clue to the Indus script is examined.
Articles on inscriptions, the script or sign system, iconography and writing in the Indus Valley Civilization from the earliest appearances of potters marks on. Includes articles by leading scholars of the Indus script, including Asko Parpola and Iravatham Mahadevan.
Interpreting the Indus Script: The Dravidian Solution
The Convocation Address of February 26, 2015 at the Dravidian University in Kuppam reflects on similarities between the Indus script and later Dravidian culture. With a number of illustrations and discussions of recent finds in south India.
A Statistical Approach for Pattern Search in Indus Writing
The first of a continuing series of articles by scientists at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) undertaking a scientific analysis of Indus sign patterns.
Statistical Analysis of the Indus Script Using n-Grams
Building on previous statistical approaches, the application of tools like n-gram Markov chains to analyze the syntax of the Indus script and form the basis for the development of a stochastic grammar to explore the syntax of the Indus script in greater detail.
Segmentation of Indus Texts
A statistical analysis by the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research Team.
The Harappan Unicorn in Eurasian and South Asian perspectives
"My conclusion," writes the Indus script scholar Asko Parpola, "is that the Indian Rsyasrnga legend goes back to the Harappan religion, where the unicorn bull depicted on thousands of seals has a real local animal, the nilgai antelope, called rsya in Sanskrit. His single horn, the length of which is exaggerated, has a phallic connotation and emphasizes the importance of this animal as a symbol of fertility."
Indus Script: Search for Grammar
Indus Script: Search for Grammar is based on a lecture first given at the Chennai Seminar The Indus Script: Problems and Prospects in 2006 with an update in Dec. 2007.
Indus Seals and Glyptic Studies: An Overview
A proof of this upcoming survey article by the dean of Indus script scholarship, Asko Parpola, is now available on Academia.edu; it will be published in the highly anticipated Seals and Sealing in the Ancient World (Cambridge, 2018).
Probabilistic Analysis of an Ancient Undeciphered Script
First published by the IEEE Computer Society in 2010, this paper by a University of Washington Professor analyzes the count of signs and combinations in the Indus script.
The Indus Script and Economics. A Role for Indus Seals and Tablets in Rationing and Administration of Labor
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.