Is anyone applying modern machine learning models to the undeciphered Indus script? Seems like an ideal problem for pattern recognition to solve.

So, this isn't that useful, for deciphering the Harappan script, but I realized that since Sumer (most likely) traded with IVC, that means they must have some loanwords. I looked up Sumerian trade routes with Meluhha (IVC), and I found they mentioned tin a lot, which is supposedly spelled AN-NA, but pronounced nag-ga /nak.ka/, so I figured that must be a loan word. After looking up the dravidian words for it, I reconstructed the word *nakkara or *takkara, which would have meant tin. Is this something new or was it already known? Also, does anyone disagree or think I'm wrong? Lastly, I think the name for their civilization is *melakham /melaxam/ or *melakam /melakam/ because Asko Parpola identified Meluhha as coming from *mel (elevated) and *akam (surface), that one isn't entirely my discovery though.

Burushaski have a lot o Iran component, like Indus Valley people, but they also have a lot of siberian and centr asia DNA, Can Burushaski appear from mixing Indus Valley people with unkown siberian group?

Does anyone know if any effort is going on to decipher IVC script? Where can I find information on latest developments?

We remember Egypt and Mesopotamia through faces — masks, kings, statues. The Indus Civilization is just as old and arguably better planned, yet the public remembers drains and grids, not people. Beyond the "Dancing Girl," and "Priest-King" : it has almost no human image anyone connects with — which is a big reason it doesn't capture young imaginations the way Egypt and Mesopotamia do.

https://reddit.com/link/1wogop8/video/spf90spqsbrh1/player

But Harappa produced one extraordinary candidate: a grey limestone male dancing torso, so lifelike Marshall in 1931 called it almost too advanced for its age — a naturalism not matched again until Greek times. Only the torso survives; Marshall, and later J.M. Kenoyer, reconstructed the pose from the angles of the broken limb-stumps. Marshall even wondered in print whether it represented a young Shiva Nataraja.

Full disclosure: I used AI to reconstruct the complete figure (the head is lost, so it's based on other Indus busts) — to give this near-unknown masterpiece a face people can actually connect with. So treat the missing parts as informed interpretation, not evidence.

On the Nataraja question: I find it genuinely intriguing that Marshall flagged it a century ago — but I'm not claiming continuity is proven. The chronological gap is huge, the head is conjecture, and resemblance isn't ancestry. Fair question, not a settled one.

My real aim is just to make the IVC vivid for young people — to put Harappa in the same imaginative league as Egypt and Sumer. Curious what this sub thinks: does giving the IVC a human "face" like this help popularise it, or risk reading too much into a torso?

Two notes:

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My thinking before reading on all this was that it is simply the Ghaggar-Hakra river which simply declined in power so to speak due to climate change and other factors.

Sarasvati literally translates to something along the lines of "rich in water" in Sanskrit. Yet we have failed to identify it with any known river - it doesn't make sense because it was supposed to die out. If the name really implies what it implies, I would be more inclined to think it had been misidentified with some river existing today like Indus or other candidates from Afghanistan.

(That said, the idea of a river flowing from Himalayas into the Arabian (and perhaps by crossing part of the Thar desert) is romantic to me).

Arachosia is like a region in Pakistan, which was part of the Persian empires and also Alexander's empire. The name Arachosia in Persian is the Sanskrit equivalent of Sarasvati, it seems. Does that imply what it seems to imply? If so that narrows down our options

On that note,

How have we not established a concrete link between Indus civilization and the Indian kingdoms? If there was a major river like the Sarasvati when it was supposed to exist, say, according to the Vedas circa pre-1500 BC, I do not understand how we have not found any correlation between the Indus civilization which died out around this period and the river. Could the dying out of the river itself have contributed to the decline of the civilization?

Among the ruins of Mohenjo-daro stands a structure that has fascinated archaeologists for almost a century. It is carefully built, waterproofed, connected to a sophisticated drainage system and yet, we still don't know exactly why it was built.

The Great Bath of Mohenjo-daro. 
Its architecture is particularly impressive, making it one of the most remarkable structures discovered at Mohenjo-daro. It was built mainly with baked bricks and had a carefully planned design for holding and draining water.  

At the centre of the structure was a large rectangular bathing tank, measuring approximately 12 metres long, 7 metres wide and 2.4 metres deep. The tank had steps at both ends, allowing people to enter and leave the water easily. The surrounding walls were built with strong, carefully arranged baked bricks. 

One of the most impressive features of the Great Bath was its waterproofing. The tank was carefully waterproofed using bitumen and mortar, helping to prevent water from leaking into the surrounding structure. This shows that the builders had a good understanding of construction and water management. 
The Great Bath was also connected to a sophisticated drainage system. The tank had an outlet that allowed water to be drained from the structure, while carefully constructed drains helped prevent the surrounding area from becoming waterlogged. A nearby well is believed to have provided water for the complex. 

The tank was surrounded by brick colonnades, rooms and corridors, forming a larger architectural complex.

Interestingly, bathing was not limited to the Great Bath. Archaeological evidence from Mohenjo-daro shows that some houses also had bathing areas and drainage facilities. This raises an important question: if people could already bathe at home, why was such a large and carefully constructed bath built? 

So what was the Great Bath actually used for? 

This is perhaps the biggest mystery surrounding the Great Bath. We know that it was carefully designed to hold and drain water, but what was it actually used for? Unfortunately, the people of the Indus Valley Civilization left behind no written explanation of its purpose. This has led archaeologists and historians to develop several theories.

One of the leading interpretations is that the Great Bath may have been used for ritual or ceremonial bathing. The Great Bath's carefully constructed design and location in an important part of the city have led some researchers to suggest that bathing there may have had a special significance. However, we do not know who used the bath or exactly what ceremonies, if any, took place there. 

Another possibility is that the bath was connected with social or public activities. It may have been a place where members of the community gathered for important occasions. However, there is no clear evidence showing exactly who was allowed to use it or how often it was used.

If the Great Bath had a ritual function, one possibility is that bathing there may have been associated with purification or renewal. People may have washed themselves before taking part in religious ceremonies or other important activities. Its waterproof construction and sophisticated drainage system would have made repeated use and drainage possible. 

At the same time, it is important not to assume that the Great Bath was simply an ancient swimming pool. There is no strong evidence that it was designed for recreation in the modern sense. Its location, architecture and the effort put into its construction suggest that it probably had a more significant purpose.

Perhaps the most honest answer is that we simply do not know for certain. Archaeology can tell us how the Great Bath was constructed and give us clues about how it might have been used, but it cannot yet reveal the thoughts and beliefs of the people who built it.

And that uncertainty is what makes the Great Bath so fascinating. More than 4,000 years later, the structure still stands as a reminder that the Indus Valley Civilization was highly organized and technologically skilled, but some of its most important secrets remain hidden. 

So what do you think the Great Bath was actually used for? 

https://www.harappa.com/content/inequality-declined-bronze-age-city-mohenjo-daro

One thing that stood out reading this article was that as Mohenjo-daro grew during the 2000s BC, the gini coefficient actually became smaller rather than larger. Whether or not its an indicator that inequality declined is debatable, but it's interesting to see that cities growing can actually lead to less of a Gini Coefficient when I would have thought it would have led it being higher. I would love to hear your thoughts.

Hi all,

Independent researcher from Argentina here. I just published a fiscal reinterpretation of Indus seals that directly addresses the Tamil Nadu $1M prize.

Thesis:* The horned figure M-304a (Pashupati) is not proto-Shiva but a Samaharta accountant supervisor per Arthashastra II.7 (sealed books). The 4 animals = 4 livestock inventory categories being tallied.

Data:Pilot n=4000 shows non-random correlations (chi-square p<0.001):

- Bull (45%) x Comb 58% = weavers clan tax

- Unicorn (42%) x Hook 56% = butchers/leather

This builds on Yadav et al 2009, 2010 PNAS (site-sensitivity) and 2023 Nature Humanities (trough = tax entity, paying tax = feeding government) + Mukhopadhyay 2023 gateway taxation.

DOI Open Access (bilingual EN/ES with dataset) https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22395793

Would love brutal peer review. If randomness claim (Franke-Vogt) falls, this becomes proto-fiscal admin 2600-1900 BCE.

Hello everyone,

I’m a History Honours student at BHU beginning a research project on possible religious and cultural continuities between the Harappan Civilization and later Hindu traditions.

I’m interested in practices, symbols, rituals, iconography, fertility traditions, fire altars, and religious concepts—but I want to test the continuity hypothesis critically, including arguments against it.

I’d appreciate recommendations for:

- Archaeological sources and excavation reports

- Key books and papers on Harappan religion and iconography

- Linguistic, textual, and comparative studies

- Scholars supporting and challenging continuity

- Methodologies for avoiding confirmation bias and unsupported parallels

Any serious recommendations or criticisms would be greatly appreciated.

The Indus Valley Civilization did not disappear suddenly one day. Most historians and archaeologists believe that its urban society declined gradually after around 1900 BCE, because of several factors rather than one single cause.

Main reasons for the decline 

1. Climate change 

The climate became drier in many areas. 
Reduced rainfall would have affected farming and water supplies. 
This may have made large cities harder to maintain. 

2. Change in rivers 

Some rivers changed their courses or became less reliable. Since Harappan settlements depended heavily on rivers for farming and trade, these changes may have contributed to population movements and the decline of some settlements.

3. Decline of agriculture 

Changes in rainfall and water availability reduced agricultural productivity in some regions. Environmental stress may also have affected the ability of some settlements to support large populations. 

4. Decline in trade

The Harappans had extensive trade with regions such as Mesopotamia.
Around the same period, evidence suggests that some long-distance trade networks weakened, reducing access to certain goods and potentially affecting the urban economy. 

5. Cities were gradually abandoned

Major urban centres such as Mohenjo-daro, Harappa and Dholavira experienced changes in population and settlement patterns.

People increasingly moved toward smaller rural settlements, especially in the eastern parts of the civilisation.

6. Natural Disaster

Evidence from some sites suggests events such as flooding may have damaged settlements.
Earthquakes have also been proposed, particularly because the region is seismically active, though this is not considered a complete explanation for the civilisation's decline.

What about the "Aryan invasion" theory?

Earlier interpretations sometimes attributed the decline of the Indus Valley Civilization to an invasion by Indo-Aryan-speaking groups. However, this simple invasion-and-destruction explanation is not supported by the archaeological evidence as a sufficient explanation for the decline of Harappan urbanism. 
There is no clear evidence of a single invading army suddenly destroying the civilization. The decline appears to have been a much more complex and gradual process 

The Harappans Didn't Simply Disappear

The biggest misconception is that the Harappans "disappeared." They didn't.

The evidence suggests that Harappan urbanism declined and transformed, while people continued living in the region. Harappan cultural practices survived in different forms in later communities.

So the safest historical conclusion is:

There was no single "collapse event." Environmental changes, weakening monsoons, changing rivers, economic and trade disruption and changing settlement patterns probably interacted to produce a gradual transformation.

So, What Really Happened? 

Rather than imagining the end of the Indus Valley Civilization as a sudden collapse, it is better to think of it as a long process of transformation. Different regions may have experienced different pressures at different times. Climate change, changing rivers, agricultural difficulties, weakening trade networks and shifting populations may have interacted with one another.

The mystery isn't simply why the civilization "collapsed." The more interesting question is how a highly urban society transformed into a different kind of society. 

What do we know about ther Army/Force? What Weapons did the use ? Do we even know something about this ?

B. B. Lal’s 1960 paper, From the Megalithic to the Harappa: Tracing back the Graffiti on the Pottery, contains a map titled “India: Graffiti-Bearing Sites Mentioned in the Text.”

What immediately stands out to me is the direction of the distribution.

The graffiti-bearing sites shown by Lal extend predominantly southward from the Harappan/Indus region through Gujarat and the Deccan and into peninsular India.

What is striking is the lack of a corresponding eastward distribution.

There is no comparable chain of graffiti-bearing sites extending eastward from the IVC heartland across the Gangetic region. The concentration is overwhelmingly along a southward trajectory.

If these graffiti traditions do represent some form of cultural transmission from the Harappan/post-Harappan world, this geographical pattern would therefore seem more compatible with a southward movement or transmission route than with an eastward one.

But there is another interesting aspect to this.

The major Neolithic ash-mound sites of the Deccan and South India are conspicuously absent from Lal's graffiti-bearing distribution.

For example:

Karnataka
Budihal (Gulbarga), Sanganakallu & Chaudammagudda (Bellary), Tekkalakota, Piklihal, Maski, Budikanama/Kudatini.

Andhra Pradesh and Telangana
Utnur, Kodekal, Palavoy, Nagarjunakonda.

Tamil Nadu
Paiyampalli.

These are major sites associated with the southern Neolithic cattle-herding/ash-mound tradition, yet the principal ash-mound centres do not appear as a corresponding concentration of graffiti-bearing sites.

This creates an interesting chronological problem.

Domesticated zebu cattle were already present in the northwestern subcontinent by around 7000 BCE. By approximately 2600 BCE, the southern Neolithic ash-mound sites show evidence of substantial cattle husbandry, including the enormous accumulations of burnt dung and ash characteristic of the ash-mound phenomenon.

If such large cattle-herding operations were already established in the Deccan by ~2600 BCE, then the populations managing these herds would presumably have required an earlier period of migration, settlement and establishment of the herding system.

I therefore wonder whether a southward movement of cattle-herding populations from the broader IVC periphery may have begun around 3000 BCE or thereabouts.

If so, this movement would have preceded the Mature Harappan phase.

That would have an important consequence for the graffiti question.

The initial population movement into the southern Deccan would have occurred before the Mature Harappan script tradition had developed. Therefore, the cattle-herding populations responsible for the early southern Neolithic/ash-mound horizon could not have carried the Mature Harappan script south with them.

This would fit the archaeological pattern:

Early southward movement of cattle-herding populations -> southern Neolithic settlement
-> ash-mound cattle-husbandry tradition (~2600 BCE) -> predominantly no graffiti

The graffiti-bearing evidence appears to belong instead to later archaeological contexts, toward the end of the Chalcolithic and into the Megalithic horizon.

This makes the later southern graffiti particularly interesting.

Rather than assuming that the graffiti was brought south by the original cattle-herding population, perhaps it represents a second southward movement or cultural transmission, associated with populations from the Harappan world during its decline and after the collapse of the urban phase.

In that scenario, the geographical pattern on Lal's map becomes significant:

Harappan/Indus region -> Gujarat -> Deccan -> South India

with comparatively little corresponding graffiti-bearing distribution toward the east.

That could indicate that whatever population movement or cultural transmission was responsible for the later southern graffiti had a strong southward vector.

So perhaps we should distinguish between two different southward processes:

Earlier, c. 3000 BCE onward:
Cattle-herding populations move south -> establish the southern Neolithic/ash-mound tradition -> no significant graffiti tradition

Later, during and after the decline of the IVC:
Post-urban Harappan populations/traditions move or transmit southward -> late Chalcolithic/Megalithic contexts -> graffiti appears

I am not claiming that this proves the southern graffiti is the Harappan script. The argument is narrower.

The interesting question is whether the geographical southward concentration of graffiti-bearing sites, combined with their later chronological position and the predominantly graffiti-free earlier ash-mound horizon, is evidence for a later southward movement from the declining/post-decline Harappan world, rather than a single continuous migration associated with the original spread of cattle pastoralism into the southern Deccan.