INDUS VALLEY CIVILIZATION

AAKANSHA12165121012/5 B.ARCH, SEMESTER – 4GSA, GITAM UNIVERSITYVISAKHAPATNAM

ABOUT• The Indus Valley Civilization (IVC) was a Bronze Age civilization (3300–1300 BCE; mature period

2600–1900 BCE) extending from what today is northeast Afghanistan to Pakistan and northwest India

• It flourished in the basins of the Indus River, one of the major rivers of Asia, and the Ghaggar-Hakra River, which once coursed through northwest India and eastern Pakistan.

• At its peak, the Indus Civilization may have had a population of over five million.

• Inhabitants of the ancient Indus river valley developed new techniques in handicraft (carnelian products, seal carving) and metallurgy (copper, bronze, lead, and tin).

• The Indus cities are noted for their urban planning, baked brick houses, elaborate drainage systems, water supply systems, and clusters of large non-residential buildings

• The Indus Valley Civilization is also known as the Harappan Civilization, after Harappa, the first of its sites to be excavated in the 1920s

• The discovery of Harappa, and soon afterwards, Mohenjo-Daro, was the culmination of work beginning in 1861

• It unified an area of 1,300,00 sq.km

• Throughout the region , more than 200 settlements sites have been found,including 6 metropolitan cities,20 towns and over 200 villages,large and small.

CULTURE• Cultural uniformity through the Indus Civilization realm was

encouraged by a standard system of weights and measures

• The main linear unites were foot and the cubit.

• The granaries were 10 cubit wide and 30 cubit long.

• Seals were delicate and refined and were normally squares varying from 20mm to 45mm wide .

• Decorative motifs on seals included intaglio designs depicting men,animals,grotesques and pictographs.

• Pottery was wheel turned punkish ware using red slip,decorated in black with variety of geometric and stylized designs.

• Stone sculpture was limited to a few representations of men or gods,frequently in a squatting positions and a few bronzes mainly of dancing girls and buffaloes.

• The hallmark of craft industry was the efficient mass production of art crafts.

• No major temple or shrine like building groups have been found,nor any material evidence of household rituals

RESOURCES• The Indus basin was rich in timber for building and fuel.

• There was no local building stone.

• Baked or kiln fired brick was the standard building material.

BUILDING TECHNIQUES• Bricks were molded or sawn and laid with alternate courses of headers and stretchers.

• A standard sizes 280mm*140mm*70mm brick was used.

• The use of unbaked brick was confined to the brick platforms upon which the major building were supported.

• Some of them were laced with timber.

• Corbelled arches in bricks were frequent

• Internally,mud plaster was used as a finish

• The roofs were constructed in timber with square section members spanning upto 4M.

• The large granaries of Mohenjo-Daro were built entirely of timber resting on a massive brick podia.

• Intricate water supply and sewage systems were built in metropolitan centres.

• Covered baked brick drains with neat inspection holes were characteristics of settlements of the Indus basin,as were public wells which were executed in fine brickwork.

ARCHITECTURAL CHARACTERMOHENJO-DARO

• The city of Mohenjo-Daro near the river Indus in Sind province,was commanded by an artificial citadel mound around 15m high,situate 150m to the N-W of the town.

• The citadel was fortified by a baked brick wall with solid towers and was dominated by a 13m high brick platform,thought to have a refugee in times of flood.

• The town occupied the area of some 2.5 km sq.

• The residential district was made up of rectangular blocks each approx. 365m*182m,orinented N and S and subdivided by lanes.

• The main streets were about 14m wide.

• The central N-S street was flanked by open drainage ditches.

• The domestic architecture of Mohenjo-Daro consisted of substantial flat roofed, single or two storeyed houses built in fire brick,organised around open courtyards and with high,featureless walls facing the surrounding streets.

• Plain doorways with timber lintels led to courtyards ,off which the household rooms opened.

• Nearly all houses had private wells,hearths and bathrooms with finely sawn brick pavements connected by drains to shafts built within the walls to sewers in the main street.

• Some houses had flights of brick stairs giving access to first floor or roof.

THE GREAT BATH• The great bath was an open air pool,about 12m*17m in plan and 2.5 m deep.

• It was constructed in sawn bricks set on edge in a gypsum mortar and sealed with bitumen.

• The bath was drained from a corbel vaulted drain fed from an outlet at S-W corner.

• Surrounding the bath was a covered colonnade and beyond it on the three sides were changing rooms staggered to give privacy and few had toilets and private bath as well.

• The bath may have featured in ritual activity.

THE GRANARY• The granary was a timber building carried on a tired brick lined podium.

• The upper tire was made up of brick work intersected by ventilation channels.

• The lower tire of mud brick reinforced with 125 square timbers.

• It was later enlarged and partially rebuilt with a brick stair leading to an upper level timber super structure.

• Its sloped externally walls gave it a grim fortress like appearance.

THE ASSEMBLY HALL• The assembly hall was rectangular in plan with four rows of 5 brick plinths which may

have supported timber columns.

• The floor was finely sawn brickwork.

• Rooms to the west contained statues and part of a ritual stone column.

• The building thought to have been an office residence measured 70m*24m and had an open courtyard 10msq. Surrounded on three sides by verandahs.

Harappa

• The layout of Harappa , on the river Ravi , a tributary of the Indus in the Punjab is similar to that of Mohenjo-Daro.

• It was built systematically divided into 12 blocks,each measuring 365m*244m.

• The citadel mound was fortified with mud brick ramparts tapering upwards from 12m thick base , with an external revetment of bake brick.

• Between the citadel and the town was a barrack like block of workmen's quarters , together with circuler brick floors on which grain was pounded.

• Two lines of small rectangular dwellings were separated by lanes about a metre wide , the whole enclosed within a compound wall.

THE GRANARY• The granary did not form part of the public installations on

the citadel mound.

• It was situated between the citadel and the river.

• It was set on the shallow brick podium about 1m high approached from the North.

• The granaries , 12 in all , each measure 16m*6m and were aligned in two rows separated by a wide central passage.

• the total floor space occupied by the granaries was around 800 m.sq.

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