PRE-MODERN URBANIZATION

Region Location Approximate date

Mesopotamia Tigris and Euphrates

Rivers

3900 BC

Egypt Nile River Valley 3200 BC

India Indus River Valley 2400 BC

Eastern Mediterranean Create 1600 BC

China Yellow River Valley 1600 BC

Mexico Yucatan Peninsula 200 BC

CULTURAL HORIZONS OF INDIA

Mesolithic 6000-4000 BCNeolithic 4000-3000 BCPre-Harappan 3000-2500 BCHarappan 2500-1900 BCLate-Harappan 1900-1400 BC

Other Chalcolithic cultures outside Harappan cultureCopper Hoards / Ochre Colored Pottery 1800-1400 BCSouthern Chalcolithic 1800-1000 BCEastern Chalcolithic 1500-1000 BC

CULTURAL HORIZONS OF INDIA

(CONTINUED)Megalithic cultures 1200-200 BCPainted Grey Ware 1100-600 BCNorthern Black Polished Ware culture 800-200 BCRecorded History 500 BC

Historic period 500 BC-300 ADGupta period 300-600 ADPost-Gupta period 600-1100 ADMedieval period 1100-1800 ADBritish period 1800-1947 AD

Archeologically demonstrable urbanization had reached the middle Ganges valley extending eastward by 500 BC if not earlier. Throughout the traditional story of Buddha’s life we encounter description of capital cities like Kapilavastu, Rajagriha, Kausambi, Vaishali, Benaras.

THE EASTWARD MOVEMENT OF URBAN CIVILIZATION IN THE SUB-CONTINENT

Mahenjodaro 3000-1500 B.C.E.

Hastinapur 1500-1000 B.C.E.

Kausambi 1000-500 B.C.E.

Mainamati 500-1 B.C.E.

DISSOCIATION FROM NATURE AND QUEST FOR SALVATION: AN URBAN QUESTION? It has been pointed out that the spiritual problem that

Buddhism addresses depicted a quintessentially urban problem. When prince Siddhartha is faced with social inequality, hunger,

poverty, disease he sees other’s suffering from the point of view of the social superior. He comes up with an urban response: suffering comes from desire, eliminate desire and there is no suffering.

Now this can never be the response of a farmer. To produce food and for the civilization one cannot be perturbed by birth, life and death. Nature teaches the farmer that everything is forever cyclical and we cannot seek fundamental truths of a mortal universe.

Buddha’s disciples are also primarily urban people, kings, queens, merchants and artisans. The audience is urban audience who do not understand the timelessness of the natural world. They are divorced from the nature by high civilization and therefore have the leisure to be perturbed by such spiritual dilemmas.

 

THE PRE-MODERN CITIES OF INDIA

The rise of the city was river centric. They were also the sacred spots—Hardwar, Benaras, Allahabad.

Apart from flowing waters what was necessary was surplus.

In the Harappan cities each had about 35,000 inhabitants. After 1400 BCE the Harappan urban centres collapsed and there was regression to villages.

AFTER A MILLENIUM (FIFTH TO THIRD BCE)

Frenetic urbanization begins in the Gangetic valley

In South India urbanization begins a little later but between third century BCE and third century CE there are host of port cities. They had trade relations with the Mediterranean.

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE ANCIENT CITIES

Ptolemy’s (AD 127-151) writings and Buddhist texts are good sources of descriptions of ancient cities.

In the Buddhist texts the term for city in Pali is thira (sthira, in Sanskrit) which means stable, durable.

The city was defined as buildings surrounded by a wall with gates and towers, and a deep moat. The city was characterized by well laid out streets, crossroads, and places where business was transacted.

A treatise on architecture in Sanskrit edited between sixth to eighth centuries A.D. states that circumvallation and fortification were constructed for most cities.

This made the word fort interchangeable with the word city.

The text recognized eight types of urban settlement.

NAGARA

A commercial centre with many merchants and markets serving a large population.

Circumvallation with gate-towers along with barracks and guard-houses appear to connect commerce with military power.

Many temples and religious communities. Not an administrative centre but rather a

religious and commercial settlement.

PURA

Pura—commercial city but of lesser means, more like a bazzar where buyer and seller meet and bargain among petty peddlers.

It is a fortified place though militarily not significant.

Agriculture was undertaken to some extent.

NAGARI

A city that incorporates both political and commercial importance with the king’s palace in the centre of the city.

PATTANA

A commercial city which was fortified with a population of various castes and with a location providing easy access to waterways linking it to foreign lands and thus allowing considerably more import and export trade than in other examples cited.

RAJDHANI

The capital city generally located in the interior on the banks of a river. It was stipulated that the king should live in the middle of the rajdhani.

KHETA

A small town where residents were of low caste (shudras). It was circumvallated with a river nearby. If could be located in the mountains.

KHARVATA

A town located in the hills near pasture land, the population included varied castes.

KUBJAKA

Settlement with heterogeneity in its population and an absence of circumvallation resulting in a lack of fortification.

It is possible that kubjaka, kharvata, kheta grew out of villages in the trade routes approaching the larger urban areas.

MUGHAL CITIES French travelers of this period have mentioned

the beauty of cities like Delhi and Agra.

The difference between the European cities and these cities was that while the European cities with large workshops were centres of production, Indian cities seemed to have substantial numbers of craftsmen catering specifically to the royal court. On a royal tour the residents of the city also had to move because they made their living by supplying goods to the court.

This report described these cities like a military encampment. Bur this was applicable only to cities like Delhi and Agra in the seventeenth century. It was an exception rather than rule.