Bricks, Beads and Bones (The Harappan Civilisation) — Practice

Question 1

Mention any three distinctive features of Harappan town planning.

Accepted Answer

(1) GRID PATTERN: streets laid out at right angles to each other, creating a well-planned city layout. (2) UNDERGROUND DRAINAGE SYSTEM: every house connected to covered brick drains running along streets, with manholes for cleaning — the most sophisticated drainage in the ancient world. (3) CITADEL AND LOWER TOWN: a raised citadel area (with public buildings like the Great Bath) and a lower residential town, suggesting a distinction between public/civic and private space. Additional: standardised 4:2:1 ratio bricks used uniformly across all sites.

Question 2

What does the evidence of long-distance trade tell us about the Harappan economy? Mention specific evidence.

Accepted Answer

The Harappan economy was well-integrated into a LONG-DISTANCE TRADE NETWORK spanning thousands of kilometres: (1) SEALS IN MESOPOTAMIA: Harappan seals (with the characteristic animal motifs and script) have been found in Mesopotamian cities like Ur — proving actual Harappan goods or merchants were present there. (2) MESOPOTAMIAN TEXTS: Mesopotamian cuneiform tablets refer to 'Meluhha' as a source of carnelian, lapis lazuli, and wood — widely identified as the Harappan region. (3) RAW MATERIALS FROM DISTANT SOURCES: Lapis lazuli (from Afghanistan), carnelian (from Gujarat), steatite — found at sites far from their geological origin, implying organised collection and trade. (4) STANDARDISED WEIGHTS: Cubical stone weights found at all major sites follow the same standard — implying a regulated commercial system where merchants could trust each other's measurements. The scale and organisation of this trade implies surplus production, specialised craft workers, and possibly merchant communities.

Question 3

Historians have used different types of sources to reconstruct the Harappan past. Discuss what we can and what we CANNOT know about Harappan society and religion, and why.

Accepted Answer

WHAT WE CAN KNOW — from material remains: (1) TOWN PLANNING: the grid layout, drainage system, and standardised bricks tell us about organised civic life and possibly centralised authority or shared standards. (2) CRAFTS AND TRADE: bead factories, standardised weights, and trade goods in Mesopotamia tell us about economic organisation and long-distance commerce. (3) SOCIAL STRATIFICATION: burial evidence — some graves with more pottery and ornaments than others — suggests some social differentiation, though not as extreme as Egypt or Mesopotamia. (4) AGRICULTURE: evidence of plough marks at Kalibangan, crop remains (wheat, barley, cotton) tell us what they grew. WHAT WE CANNOT KNOW — and WHY: (1) LANGUAGE AND HISTORY: the Harappan script is UNDECIPHERED. Without reading the script, we cannot know their language, their history in their own words, their laws, or their literature. (2) RELIGION: We find the Great Bath (possibly ritual), terracotta figurines (interpreted as 'mother goddess'), seals with a figure in yogic posture ('proto-Shiva'). But ALL of these are SPECULATIVE INTERPRETATIONS — we cannot confirm any religious belief or practice. (3) POLITICAL SYSTEM: Was there a king? A council? A priest-king? The 'priest-king' figurine is an ARCHAEOLOGICAL GUESS, not a confirmed identification. The absence of palaces and royal tombs (unlike Mesopotamia) is distinctive — but its meaning is disputed. (4) THE END: Why the civilisation declined is debated — climate change, river shifts, and trade decline are all proposed, but none is proven conclusively. CONCLUSION: The Harappan civilisation is the most archaeological of ancient civilisations — our knowledge is entirely dependent on objects, not texts. This makes it simultaneously fascinating (the cities, the crafts, the trade) and frustratingly incomplete (the people, the beliefs, the stories).

Practice — Bricks, Beads and Bones (The Harappan Civilisation)

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