in deciphering the Minoan "Linear B" script of Crete-without a bilingual-was about to set about this equally difficult task. Unhappily, Ventris was tragically killed in a motor accident a few weeks before these lines were written.) The problem of dating has still not been completely solved, but from objects of other known cultures found on Harappan sites archaeologists cautiously infer that the earliest date of the developed Harappan civilization c as represented by the cities) is not earlier than about 2500 B.C. However, both at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro there are still lower occupation levels which have not yet been examined. The rivers have risen considerably since these cities were built and below a certain depth it is impossible to proceed without elaborate pumping-gear. Did the Indus Valley civilization develop independently or was it in any way related to the earlier valley-cultures of Lower Mesopotamia? Informed opinion seems to be that while the Harappans, whose civilization apparently developed after that of Sumeria, may have received the idea from that area, they developed their own distinctive culture pattern independently of Mesopotamia. "Evidence for contact" with the West "before 2300 B.C." writes Wheeler, 'is not impressive." 5 As for the closing dates, the Indus civilization appears to have continued well into the first half of the second millennium B.C., i.e. the time of the Aryan invasion of about 1500 B.C. The traditions recorded in the Rig Veda have taken on a new aspect since the discovery of Harappa and Mohenjo-daro. It now seems very possible that the "forts" and "castles" which the god Indra "rent as age consumed a garment" were the walled cities of the Harappans; not only Mohenjo-daro and Harappa itself but other fortified towns and villages of the same period which archaeologists have discovered along the river banks between and beyond the two principal cities. "Literary (or rather oral) tradition and archaeological inference have apparently more in common with each other than had previously been suspected.” 5 The reasons for the decline of the Indus Valley civilization are not entirely clear. Some authorities suggest that climatic changes, a reduction in rainfall, may have altered the character of the land so that it could no longer support the abundance of plant and animal life on which the Harappan economic structure depended. This is a debatable point; if there were climatic changes, were they brought about through natural causes, or man-made ones; or both? The millions of kiln-dried bricks used in the construction of Mohenjo- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 5 Wheeler, Sir Mortimer : The Indus Age |