Sahni mentioned the highest mound at Harappa to be ‘the summit of the northern portion of Mound B”. This is one of the views of this portion, with a person, wearing glasses, standing.
Of ‘brick-robbing’ at Harappa in the modern times, John Marshall reported in ARASI 1924-25, that: “At Harappa most of the ancient structures near the surface of the mounds have been sadly damaged by the depredations of villagers and railway contractors in search of bricks, but it is unlikely that much harm has been done to the lower strata” (p. 62).
- Marshall, J.H. ‘The Prehistoric Civilization of the Indus’ ARASI 1924-25, pp. 60-63.
In the preface to his excavation report Vats noted:
“But if Harappa, by its size and importance, may thus be regarded as one of the twin centres of the Indus Valley Civilization [the other being Mohenjodaro], such buildings as it possessed have been mostly swept away by brick diggings carried on for more three quarters of a century until the site was declared protected in 1920” (p. ii).
In his summary of the earlier explorations and excavations at Harappa, Vats provided a detailed report of the brick robbing, and also mentioned the ‘summit mound’ in AB:
“The mounds at Harappa are a prominent landmark in the countryside visible long distances away. They were visited by Masson in 1826, by Burnes five years later, and by General Cunningham twice in 1853 and 1856. Burnes estimated the extent of the ruins as “about three miles in circumference, which”, says Cunningham, “is one-half too much, as the actual ruined mound forms an irregular square of only half a mile on each side or two miles in circuit. But this comprises only the remains of the walled town, to which we may fairly add the suburbs, or fields now covered with the broken bricks or other remains, which would bring the size of the old town quite up to Burnes’s estimate.” [footnote 4]Cunningham published a plan of the mounds together with an account of what he saw in 1853 and again in 1856 in his Annual Report for 1872-73. [footnote 5] ‘On the north, the west and the south’, says he, ‘there is a continuous line of mounds about 3,500 feet in length, but on the east side, which is only 2,000 feet in length, there is a complete gap of 800 feet. … The whole circuit of ruins is, therefore, about 12,500 feet or nearly 2 ½ miles. The highest mound is on the north-west, which is 60 feet above the fields.’ Cunningham traced the remains of flights of steps on both the eastern and western faces of the high mound at the north-west, as well as the basement of a large square building. This part has been designated on his plan as AB. None of these structures is traceable now, though the tomb of Naugaza and the ruined Id-gah are still to be seen on the eastern slope of the mound. … According to him, the remains at Harappa had more than sufficed to furnish brick ballast for about 100 miles of the Lahore-Multan Railway. Since then brick-digging has been carried on with equal vigour by the people as a ready means of livelihood, for, it is patent that the town of Harappa, which shelters about 5,000 souls, as well as some neighbouring Chaks (colonies) mainly owe their burnt brick houses to these ruins. The mounds were declared protected under the Ancient Monuments Preservation Act (VII) of 1904 only in January, 1920, and it was not till 1919 that the first brick kiln for manufacturing bricks was started here. Regarding the spoliation of the mounds Cunningham says ‘I made several excavations at Harappa, but the whole surface had been so completely cleared out by the railway contractors that I found very little worth preserving’. Working on Mound D, I myself picked up an iron fish-plate and a few bolts of the light railway mentioned by General Cunningham. After eleven years work by the Archaeological Department, it is all too apparent that General Cunningham was justified in what he said ; and from the time of his visit in 1856 till the protection of the mounds in 1919, under the Ancient Monuments Preservation Act, the depredations, referred to by him, went on to an ever increasing extent. The little that has actually survived is a perpetual puzzle which at every step baffles the excavator. Only once in a while can one hope to find anything more than a complete room, let alone houses, streets and such elaborate complexes as are to be seen at Mohenjo-daro” (Vats 1940, pp. 2-3).
Footnote 4: Cunningham, Ancient Geography of India, 1924 Edition, p. 242
Footnote 5: C.S.R., Vol. V, pp. 105-108
(Vats 1940, Vol. I, p. 2)