Above: Mohenjodaro - The foundations of many houses were constructed on top of massive mud brick platforms such as this one eroding from the edge of the mound along the major east-west street dividing HR and VS areas.
The origins of certain types of weights and measures in South Asia can be traced back to the earliest cities of the Indus civilization. This chapter presents an overview of the types of artefacts that inform us about ancient Harappan measurement systems, in order to gain insight into their concepts of order and cosmology. The main focus is on recent discoveries at the site of Harappa, Pakistan, where detailed measurements have been made of a wide range of artefacts in an attempt to understand better the standardization and regional variation of Indus measurement systems.