No Fermi Paradox with Indus civilization pegged at 9000 yrs BP as the oldest civilization.

A scientific research done by a team of researchers from IIT, Khragpur on the excavated items from the archaeological trenches of Bhirrana in Haryana for the purpose of reconstructing the paleo-monsoonal history of the settlement had thrown up a new insight into the age of Indus civilisation sites by pushing up the date to sometime around 9000 years before present. Though the primary aim of the study was to reconstruct the monsoonal activity in the past in that part of India, their findings have revealed a major feature that there was continuity in the settlements in the region that is considered as Indus civilization. Though monsoon pattern had changed leading to drought conditions, people did not leave their places but continued to stay there by trying out alternate means of cultivation and subsistence strategies.

What we infer from this is given below:

·         The settlement and the civilization in the Indus region predate the officially accepted old civilizations of Egypt and Mesopotamia. So there is a need to re-write the chronology of world civilizations and also the history of India.

·         There is no Aryan Invasion that destroyed and pushed the people from this region. Nor was there any collapse of the civilisation thereby showing that the people had continued which also means that they still continue. The continuity is seen not only in the present population in the Indus sites but even throughout India. For example the house structure and bath facilities and the drainage are the same throughout India. Though urban India had abandoned them in the last few decades, the structure is same in rural India.  The picture below shows the backyard of a house in Sindh in Indus region which shows a well and the drainage in a narrow street at the back of the house. This was the same plan in excavated structures and continues to be the same throughout rural India even today.

·         There is indigenous and continuing population in India for all these 9000 years (or more than that) thereby lending enough time for the growth of a civilisation that is known to the indigenous people as Vedic but by modern classification given a name as Indus or Harappan civilisation.

·         The river Saraswathi gushing in a majestic and mighty way in this part of India as extolled by Vedic verses is very much true. The report says

“Bhirrana was part of a high concentration of settlements along the dried up mythical Vedic river valley ‘Saraswati’, an extension of Ghaggar river in the Thar desert. Isotope and archaeological data suggest that the pre-Harappans started inhabiting this area along the mighty Ghaggar-Hakra rivers fed by intensified monsoon from 9 to 7 ka BP.”

The following map has been reproduced from the research article.

(A) Map of Northwest India and Pakistan (created by Coreldraw x7;http://www.coreldraw.com) showing the locations of main Harappan settlements including phosphate sampling site of Bhirrana, Haryana, IWIN precipitation sampling station at Hisar and two paleo-lakes Riwasa and Kotla Dahar studied earlier (see Fig. 3 and text for details). Black dotted lines represent 100 mm rainfall isohyets. Approximate trace of dried paleo-channel of ‘Saraswati’ (dashed white lines in Fig. 1A) is also shown. Black arrow indicates the direction of monsoon moisture transport from Bay of Bengal. (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article). Figure created by CorelDRAW Graphics Suite X7 (http://www.coreldraw.com) (B) Panoramic view of the excavation of mature Harappan stage at Bhirrana view from North-east (photograph reproduced with the permission of Archeological Survey of India).

The news about this research has appeared in many magazines in India and in blogs in the last few days. Expectedly, this report has agonised the AIT Indologists, as we can see in the reaction of Mr Steve Farmer who has called this report along with the findings of Sangam age elements in Kaazhadi in Tamilnadu as ‘Archaeological garbage’ fed to the Indian Public.

On the research by IITians in the Indus site of Bhirrana, he quotes a blog from Times of India, and has written as follows:

“Report in a blog post in today’s _Times of India_ on the paper recently published (as noted yesterday on our List) disputing earlier claimed correlations between climate changes and the eventual collapse (in the early second millennium BCE) of urban Indus civilization; title of the _Times_ article, whose conclusions are totally unrelated to the scientific paper (which has its own problems):

"Indus Valley civilisation could be older than Egypt’s pharaohs, Mesopotamia"

http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/academic-interest/indus-valley-civilisation-could-be-older-than-egypts-pharaohs-mesopotamia/ <http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/academic-interest/indus-valley-civilisation-could-be-older-than-egypts-pharaohs-mesopotamia/>

The original paper, as noted yesterday, implies nothing remotely like this. Nor is it published in _Nature_ but in a much lower impact online journal published by the same company that publishes Nature, _Scientific Reports_.

It mentions in passing that evidence of human habitation (which it clearly designates as “pre-Harappan,” not "Harappan") in the Indus region can be traced back to ca. 9000-7000 ybp (years before the present) — no much of a surprise, since human habitation of India is known from many tens of thousands of years earlier.

But, as pointed out yesterday, this has nothing to do with Indus urban civilization, which (as the article correctly notes) has long been known to have come only in the mid 3rd millennium BCE.

But what are a few thousand years in pop-culture reports about “timeless” India?

The point of the original paper, which can be read here in full http://www.nature.com/articles/srep26555#f1<http://www.nature.com/articles/srep26555#f1> (be patient, since server demand for the paper due to the false news reports is large), is to argue that the much later urban civilization in the Indus Valley and other civilizations of the same period did not collapse (in the 2nd millennium BCE) due to global changes in climate, as sometimes argued, but involved much more complex variables including major alterations in agricultural practices.

The world — and not just India, as witnessed by Trump proto-fascist movement in the US — is declining increasingly into a global idiocracy, as if that weren't already obvious.

And worse is probably to come….

For black humor amusement purposes, here are a few lines from the Times of India article today:
> If this evidence, published in the journal ‘Nature’ (sic) and using cutting-edge ‘optically stimulated luminescence’ on technologies on ancient pottery shards, is correct then it would substantially push back the beginnings of ancient Indian history, proving that it took root well before the pharaohs of Egyptian (7000BC to 3000BC) and the Mesopotamian (6500BC to 3100BC) civilizations in the valley of the Tigris and the Euphrates. Researchers have also found evidence of a pre-Harappan civilization that existed for at least 1,000 years before this and it may force a global rethink on the generally accepted timelines of so-called ‘cradles of civilization’. 

> This is a quantum leap, if their claims are correct. The scientists are not just shifting a few years here and there. They are saying that their evidence pushes back the mature phase of the Indus Valley Civilisation (with big remains in Harapa (sic) and Mohen-jo-Daro in modern Pakistan and Dholavira in Gujarat along with a 100 other sites) from its current dating of 2600-1700 BC to 8000-2000 BC. This also pushes back the pre-Harappan phase from 9000-8000 BC.

There is nothing at all in the paper that supports any of these claims, and the range of dates (8000-2000 BC) for “mature” Harappan civilization is ludicrous.

Cheers and think of Fermi’s paradox: “Where is everybody?”

We may have to add a new "idiocracy solution" to one of the most popular current solutions to Fermi's paradox:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox#It_is_the_nature_of_intelligent_life_to_destroy_itself<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox#It_is_the_nature_of_intelligent_life_to_destroy_itself>”

//

Without going into the merits and demerits of the research or disputing it to establish his view point, Mr Farmer has picked up a blogpost and tried to “ridicule” the author, in the course of which he has only betrayed his ignorance of what the research paper has said and how it could be interpreted.

Let me take up his views point by point.

{The blog post of TOI that he refers to can be read HERE.}

Mr Farmer’s accusation 1:- The title of the post “"Indus Valley civilisation could be older than Egypt’s pharaohs, Mesopotamia" is unrelated to the scientific paper.

My reply: The research paper has got its own aims, but from what it says, one can derive inferences. The research paper has clearly re-done the date of the phases of the Indus civilisation by pushing the Early Ravi Phase to 9 to 6.3 ka BP (thousands of years before present).

The following table gives an idea of how the research findings contradict the existing dates of Indus civilization.

Harappan (Indus) Phases	Existing date	Date given by the Research
Early Ravi Phase	5.7 - 4.8 ka BP	9 - 6.3 ka BP
Kot Diji Phase	4.8 – 4.6 ka BP	6.3 – 5.2 ka BP
Mature Phase	4.6 – 3.9 ka BP	5.2 – 3 ka BP
Late Declining Phase	3.9 – 3.3 ka BP	3 – 2.5 ka BP

The research clearly pegs the Early Ravi date at 9000 yrs BP which makes this older than Egyptian and Mesapotamian civilisations.

This conclusion from the blogger is nothing new as there already exists many works by both Indian and western scholars that Egptian and Mesapotomian cultures have derived inputs from the Vedic civilization.  In other words, Vedic civilization was the progenitor of these civilizations. The present research gives scientific backing to push the date of Vedic (Harappan) civilisation much before those civilizations.

This is not the first time the same location, Bhirrana in Haryana had given this conclusion. There already appeared a research paper in 2012 with a conclusion that Indus civilisation was 2000 years older than previously thought. In an article written in Global Post in 2012 it was reported that the archaeologists who analysed the Bhirrana remains found out that the so-called pre-Harappan period which is considered as primitive and of stone age culture was not at all primitive.

According to them,

“The earliest levels at Bhirrana and Kunal yielded ceramics and antiquities ... suggesting a continuity in culture, right from the middle of the eighth millennium BCE onwards ... till about 1800 BCE.”

These analysts are not novice in the field but have held top position in the ASI. They arrived at a conclusion that the presence of relatively advanced pottery known as “hakra ware” at a date around 7500 BCE in Bhirrana, shows that the civilisation was technologically advanced at that time thereby qualifying to be rated as the earliest civilisation of the world.  The epicentre of this Hakra ware is found in Indian States of Haryana and Rajasthan and not across the border.

The current research, using advanced techniques of science has reiterated what was reported in 2012 by the heads of ASI as narrated above.

Accusation 2: This paper was not published in Nature but in a much lower impact online journal published by the same company that publishes Nature, Scientific Reports.

Reply: The paper has been published at http://www.nature.com/articles/srep26555#f1. The website says it is nature.com. Is it the company’s name or the journal’s name?  The paper has appeared in www.nature.com in its Scientific Reports section. The (official) website of Indus culture, www.harappa.com also has posted the link to this research paper in its website with a note that this paper was published in Nature. (Read HERE). Have all of them been fooled to believe that the Nature in that dot com is a fake one?

The next issue is that it is “a much mower impact online journal”. In this Internet age, how can he say that it is a low impact journal? Mr Farmer himself has taken pains to read it from this online journal and ‘reviewed’ it. Why should he bother to read it if it is a low impact journal?

But the reality is that by making it easy to access for common folks, the journal has enabled millions to access this research paper. Now its findings are common knowledge for many. Perhaps Mr Farmer is worried that this kind of easy accessibility would make his job tough in defending his pet Indological idiocracies.

Accusation 3: It mentions in passing that evidence of human habitation (which it clearly designates as “pre-Harappan,” not "Harappan") in the Indus region can be traced back to ca. 9000-7000 ybp (years before the present) — no much of a surprise, since human habitation of India is known from many tens of thousands of years earlier.

Reply: Thanks to Mr Farmer for accepting that India was inhabited for many tens of thousands of years even prior to 9000 yrs BP. He wanted to question such an olden date but ended up saying the above. All that he could say is that there is a passing mention of the date in the paper.

The purpose of this research is not archaeological or historical. It is to apply certain technological tools to re-construct the monsoon model over thousands of years. The researchers are from IIT and their interest is mainly technical. Bhirrana fulfils their requirement in terms of location and availability of samples from different time periods.

The very title of the research is “Oxygen isotope in archaeological bioapatites from India: Implications to climate change and decline of Bronze Age Harappan civilization” which shows where lies their interest. Their conclusion is spelt in the last sentence – “Our study suggests possibility of a direct connect between climate, agriculture and subsistence pattern during the Harappan civilization.”

This finding negates the existing theories on the causes of the end of this civilisation, one of which is the AIT. In the penultimate sentence they have written what is disproved by their findings – it is that the causes for de-urbanisation were climate – subsistence based ones and not “abrupt collapse as suggested by many workers” Therefore whether they made a passing reference or a detailed reference to the dates is not an issue for them.

This research is comparable in its outcome to the research done by IIT Kanpur Professor R.Balasubramanian on the Iron Pillar of Delhi. What he did was to measure the dimensions of various old structures from Harappan to Gupta period and the Iron pillar. What he found out was that the dimensions were Vasthu compliant and were the same in all structures from Harappan to Gupta period including the Iron pillar. (Read here)

Accusation 4: But, as pointed out yesterday, this has nothing to do with Indus urban civilization, which (as the article correctly notes) has long been known to have come only in the mid 3rd millennium BCE. 

Reply: The paper does not undermine the earliest Hakra phase of 9000 yrs BP as non- urban. Read what it says:

“At Bhirrana the Hakra ware culture period is the earliest and occurs as an independent stratigraphic horizon17^,34. The Hakra phase was primarily identified by ceramics such as mud appliqué ware, incised ware, and bi-chrome ware, much similar to the Pre-Harappan phase in Cholistan (Figs 1A and 3C 36) and was characterized by its subterranean dwelling, sacrificial and industrial pits8^,17^,34. The Early Harappan phase shows settlement expansion, mud brick houses with advanced material culture including arrow heads, rings and bangles of copper; beads of carnelian, jasper, and shell; bull figurines; chert blades; terracotta bangles, etc.”

The same view of an industrial atmosphere in Early Hakra phase was expressed by the ASI heads also in their 2012 research. That means that right from 9000 yrs BP, the Harappan civilisation had been urban and an organised industrial hub.

For the information of Mr Farmer, the 3^rd Millennium Harappan culture was post- Mahabharata culture when the fleeing residents of a Dwaraka led by Arjuna settled down in this phase.

Arjuna’s route based on Mausala parva of Mahabharata.

For details read my article here.

The knowledge of building structures could not have come in a day. What we see in Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa were built by an already knowledgeable people. Dwaraka was a built city with the aid of 18 sects of people who came along with Krishna from the Gangetic plain. Their knowledge helped in raising the structures in the Indus settlements in the 3^rd Millennium when they migrated to those regions.

One example that I can show is the presence of narrow streets in Mohenjo-Daro in certain sections which are similar to streets in Brindhavan where Krishna spent his younger days. The narrow streets are found in the habitat of cattle rearers.

(Narrow streets of Brindhavan)

Narrow streets of Mohenjo-Daro.

Closed drains on the side of the narrow streets in Brindhavan

Similar looking narrow streets of Mohenjo-Daro with drains on the side.

For more details read my article in Tamil HERE.

It may be argued that Bridhavan streets were recent and could be the result of Harappan influence. If someone says this they have to prove and show evidence. When I say that the model of Brindhavan Street was replicated in Mohenjo-Daro, I am equipped with literary and oral versions that say Krishna and his cattle rearing people lived in Brindhavan about 5000 years ago, where the streets were built narrow to facilitate lined movement of cattle.

Moreover the land / house possession is such that it continues down the ages. The buildings in Brindhavan streets may be recent, but the ownership of the house / land could have continued without any scope for expanding or removing the streets and the adjacent houses. Within the same campus, the houses may have been repaired and rebuilt many times, but the street plan and houses could not be changed in a continuing habitation. Moreover, in Brindhavan, the memory of Krishna had made the inhabitants keep the city as it was in Krishna’s times.

 From Brindhavan and Mathura, people relocated to Dwaraka to build a kingdom – an urban dwelling for Krishna. The city of Dwaraka was surrounded by walls made of / plated with copper. This information is there in the Sangam text of Purananuru in Tamil (verse no 201. Read the details in my blog HERE. ) The age mentioned in that verse pertains to 3500 yrs BP, which is the time that Indus civilisation started to decline. The verse addresses a king of Mysore, then called as “Erumaiyur” (land of buffalo – a reference to Mahishasura), whose ancestors ruled from Dwaraka surrounded by copper walls, 49 generations before this king. I am writing this here to show that there are internal references like this to cross-check and concur with the history of India as told by the Ithihasas and Puranas. Just by reading the Vedas and calling oneself as an Indologist, one cannot unravel the source and culture of Indus findings. One must know the varied inputs from internal sources to arrive at the true picture. 

This input from Sangam verse also establishes that Dwaraka was an urban city where copper and metal works were put into vast use such as building walls. Mahabharata says that the people of Dwaraka left the city after Krishna’s exit. Where did they go? While one group came to South India as revealed in Tamil Sangam texts, all the others left the city after sea water gushed into the city. Under Arjuna’s guidance they went along the Indus and Saraswathi River where it was visible and settled down there. The Indus settlements along the river Saraswathi concur with Mausala parva locations thereby giving jutification for the sudden spurt in urban buildings in this region in the 3^rd Millennium BC.

Mohenjo-Daro was one such place that was built and occupied by the people of Dwaraka. A strong reason for this is in the name – Mohenjo-Daro. There are many locations in Pakistan ending with Daro, Dera, Deri etc. There are many temples ending with Dera and Deri in Gujarat also.  Dera and Deri are the words for temples in Gujarati language. Deri refers to small temple and Dera refers to big temple.

Mohenjo-Daro must have been Mohenjo Dera which means Mohan’s temple. Mohana-sa becoming Mohencha is the development of the word for ‘of Mohan” in Prakruth language. Mohencha Dera became Mohenjo daro in course of time. Mohen in this name refers to Krishna of Dwaraka. The name of the temple came to refer to the place itself. This is the internal evidence for the name ‘Mohen’ and Dera in the name of the Mohenjo-Daro and the urban city plan.

The date of Mohenjo-Daro coincides with the traditional date of the end of Mahabharata war and the exit of Krishna as we in India as a Vedic society still follow the calendar system that locates our time in Kaliyuga that is more than 5000 years old as of today. The Kaliyuga computation began soon after the exit of Krishna from mortal coils.

After this Mr Farmer repeats the finding of the paper and then proceeds to ridicule the blogger for inferring that Indus much predates Egyptian and Mesapotomian cultures. The blogger is right in making this inference as this research has rewritten the date of Indus of the Early Phase. The Mature Phase coincides with Egyptian and Mesapotomian cultures.

There are umpteen sources in Indian texts and contexts to show that culture flowed from India to these places. One example I am giving here is on Karnak temple in Egypt. It is a sun temple. What is the ‘Ark’ in Karnak”? Is it Arka, the Sun? For we have a “Konark” in Oddhisha, which though recent in chronology stands for Sun.

Karnak temple.

Konark temple.

The activity in Karnak started at a time that coincided with the Mahabharata age of 5000 yrs BP. One historical figure with a name that sounds closer to Karnak was present at that time. It was Karna.

Why is there a phonetic link between Karna, the son of Sun and Karnak in Egypt which is dedicated to Sun?

Is this not worthy enough for a research?

Similarly why a Sun temple in Egypt should have a Sanskrit name for Sun which is common in India as seen in the name Konark?

Is this not worthy of research?

But Mr Farmer would have a ready retort that this is Fascism and Hindu fanaticism. But nowadays he likes to call it as Trump-like fascism! It is up to him to explain how this is fascism or Trump like fascism.

Let me come back to the example case that is fit for research to show why Karnak, Karna and Konark sound similar.

Mahabharata says that Karna had 9 sons and all but one of them was killed in the Mahabharata war. Only Vrushakethu survived and he was patronised by the Pandavas, particularly Arjuna. Arjuna trained him in archery and made him a fine archer. He took him in his expeditions before the Aswamedha yajna. He went both to the East and West direction according to Mahabharata. During that expedition, Vrushakethu married the daughter of a king called Yavanatha, which sounds like a king in the west of India. After this there was no news about Vrushakethu.

There is every chance that he went along with his wife’s side and even landed at Egypt to establish a Sun temple in his father’s memory at Karnak.

The name Karnak sounds familiar with places of Karna. One is Karnal in Haryana which is supposed to be the place where Karna was born. Another was ‘Karnali’ in Vadodara in Gujarat. The olden name of Vadodara was Virakshetra or Viravati. It is believed that this refers to warrior-dom. But Vrushali was the name of one of the two wives of Karana. It is possible that Vrushakethu was born to Vrushali.

The name Karnali in Vadodara or Virakshetra makes an intriguing connection between Vrushali – Karna – Vrishakethu. If this region was the native place of Vrushali, Karna’s wife, there is scope for calling this place as Karnali. The Virakshetra could perhaps be originally called as Vrusha-kshetra, taking the name from Karna’s wife or his son. Karnali and Vadodara deserve an archaeological study.

The common thread between Karnak and Karnali is that they lie in close latitudes. Karnak is 25.4 degrees North whereas Karnali is 21.9 degrees North. Similarly Karnak and Konark both hosting Sun temple are also in close latitudes.

Karnali in Gujarat lies close to the line that links them.

This alignment in location and similarity in names and meanings deserve a deeper research.

Why and how the names of Sun temple are the same in two different cultures?

Why Karnali and Karnak have commonalities with names of Karna’s family?

Vrusha in the name of Vrushakethu means bull. Bull is sacred throughout Egypt.

The worship of the bull in Egypt is similar to Indian practices. How did this happen in Egypt? Was it connected with Vrushakethu? 

There is another interesting feature in Karnak.

The Karnak temple has an image as this:

They are Archers in the battle field. We cannot help thinking about Vrushakethu as an archer trained by Arjuna. The close up of another image in Karnak is shown below.

The archer again, but look at his ear. It is pierced as in Vedic society. Not many archers are there among Egyptian kings. But Vrusha (bull) and Vrushakethu, the archer lend more credence to Indian connections to Egypt.

Do these not merit a deeper research? 

The current research paper raises the chances for digging more into Indian past particularly the Mahabharata resources that have many references to people outside India in the West and Far West. This research paper raises the possibility of Indian culture being older than Egyptian culture and even be a progenitor of Egptian culture. Already 20 items have been noted by scholars as being Indian / Vedic in the Egyptian culture. What I have written here on Egypt is just a tip of the iceberg. The entire range of similarities merits a separate post. I am giving in this post the Vrushakethu link alone to show that there are broken links in Indian context to relate to Egypt. A chronological order falling in line is another link in the chain to connect the Indian and Egptian cultures.

Mr Farmer calls the possibility of Indian / Indus culture as preceding the culture of Egypt and Mesopotamia as “black humour amusement”

He says,

“There is nothing at all in the paper that supports any of these claims, and the range of dates (8000-2000 BC) for “mature” Harappan civilization is ludicrous.”

Reply: The paper does not claim that Indus pre-dates the other cultures, but it does give a date of Indus culture that is far olden than the other cultures. This opens the need for re-working on the chronology of these cultures.

The second point that he calls ludicrous is the range of dates. The paper clearly states the differences in the layers of different phases starting from pre-Harappan Hakra ware phase, based on a technique called opticaally stimulated luminescence  (OSL) which gives a more accurate dating. When they started, the conventional chronology of the Harappan civilisation derived from radio carbon dating was indeed taken as the base. The difference between radio carbon dating and OSL is that the former is used to date organic materials whereas the OSL helps in dating the minerals. OSL dating is gaining ground nowadays in archaeology. When OSL was applied to date the fossil items of each phase, the researchers have found them to be 2000 years older than what was previously established by carbon dating. Theirs is purely an advanced scientific analysis where they have no interest in what Mr Farmer calls “Fascist” statements.

For comparison they used the monsoon records from the Arabian Sea and 2 lakes near Bhirrana. It was consistent with Bhirrana findings of weak monsoon activity before 9000 yrs BP and intensification between 9 to 7 ka BP. Their classification of the phases is based on monsoon impact on mammals and cultivation strategies. Their classification of Mature Phase on this basis coincides with post Mahabharata settlements that I wrote above, which saw a spurt in urban building.

Thus the paper offers a cross-check to the previously held archaeological dating. It fine-tuned the previous carbon dated period by its more advanced scientific technique and found out that early Hakra Phase is 2000 years older than what is previously found by carbon dating. The ranges of the periods also differed reflecting the monsoonal activity which is crucial for the subsistence of the culture.   

Finally Mr Farmer calls this a Fermi Paradox and suggests to adding idiocracy as one of its solutions. It is he who has to don the cap of idiocracy as the Fermi paradox is not an apt comparison to the current findings.

Fermi Paradox works on contradictions between lack of evidence and a probability.

In this case, there is evidence of Indian  / Vedic influence all around. There is evidence of Indian cultural practices in Egypt and Mesapotomia and in other regions of the world too. For example, the name Sumeru – has Meru which is an Indian concept. There are many which I have written in other articles in this blogspot. The above mentioned one on Karna’s connection to Karnak is another evidence of influence from India. The evidences increase the probability (of Indian / Indus civilisation as a precursor to other civilisations) and are not contradictory to the probability. There is no absence of evidence either as in Fermi paradox.

Hence the question is not “Where is everybody”?

The question is WHY everybody is like this (Vedic/ Indian)?

This increases the probability that India was the cradle of or progenitor for these cultures.

A research like the current one adds another leaf to the list of probabilities for the evidence that is found all around.

Post script:-

The discovery of origins of river Nile was attributed to Indian knowledge.

//
The Puranas have a remarkable connection with one of the most important discoveries of the 19th century. In 1858, John Hanning Speke (1827-1864) – Speke was commissioned in the British Indian Army in 1844 – made the discovery that Lake Victoria was the source of the River Nile in Africa. Speke wrote that to some Indian Pundits (Hindu scholars) the Nile was known as Nila, and also as Kaali. Nila means blue and Kaali means dark – both apt descriptions for the Nile near its source. These are mentioned in several Puranas including the Bhavishaya. This went against the conventional wisdom, for Lake Victoria was unknown at the time. Sir Richard Burton, the leader of the Nile expedition, had identified Lake Tangyanika as the source. Speke, however, following upon the advice of a Benares (Varansi) Pundit, insisted that the real source was a much large lake that lay to the north. Following this advice Speke went on to discover Victoria. The Pundit had also told him that the real source were twin peaks as Somagiri, ‘Soma’ in Sanskrit stands for moon and ‘giri’ means peak, and Somagiri therefore are none other than the fabled Mountains of the Moon in Central Africa! The Pundit must have known all this. He published his book Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile in 1863.
//

Related article

Date of Indian civilization pushed upto 7500 BC!

Harappa-like structure found in Tamilnadu is not archaeological garbage.

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From

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Indus-era-8000-years-old-not-5500-ended-because-of-weaker-monsoon/articleshow/52485332.cms

Indus era 8,000 years old, not 5,500; ended because of weaker monsoon

Jhimli Mukherjee Pandey| TNN | May 29, 2016, 01.37 AM IST

A painting on Indus Valley civilization.( TOI photo by Sanjay Hadkar)

KOLKATA: It may be time to rewrite history textbooks. Scientists from IIT-Kharagpurand Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) have uncovered evidence that the Indus Valley Civilization is at least 8,000 years old, and not 5,500 years old, taking root well before the Egyptian (7000BC to 3000BC) and Mesopotamian (6500BC to 3100BC) civilizations. What's more, the researchers have found evidence of a pre-Harappan civilization that existed for at least 1,000 years before this.

The discovery, published in the prestigious 'Nature' journal on May 25, may force a global rethink on the timelines of the so-called 'cradles of civilization'. The scientists believe they also know why the civilization ended about 3,000 years ago — climate change.

"We have recovered perhaps the oldest pottery from the civilization. We used a technique called 'optically stimulated luminescence' to date pottery shards of the Early Mature Harappan time to nearly 6,000 years ago and the cultural levels of pre-Harappan Hakra phase as far back as 8,000 years," said Anindya Sarkar, head of the department of geology and geophysics at IIT-Kgp.

The team had actually set out to prove that the civilization proliferated to other Indian sites like Bhirrana and Rakhigarrhi in Haryana, apart from the known locations of Harappa and Mohenjo Daro in Pakistan and Lothal, Dholavira and Kalibangan in India. They took their dig to an unexplored site, Bhirrana — and ended up unearthing something much bigger. The excavation also yielded large quantities of animal remains like bones, teeth, horn cores of cow, goat, deer and antelope, which were put through Carbon 14 analysis to decipher antiquity and the climatic conditions in which the civilization flourished, said Arati Deshpande Mukherjee of Deccan College, which helped analyse the finds along with Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad.

The researchers believe that the Indus Valley Civilization spread over a vast expanse of India — stretching to the banks of the now "lost" Saraswati river or the Ghaggar-Hakra river - but this has not been studied enough because what we know so far is based on British excavations. "At the excavation sites, we saw preservation of all cultural levels right from the pre-Indus Valley Civilization phase (9000-8000 BC) through what we have categorised as Early Harappan (8000-7000BC) to the Mature Harappan times," said Sarkar.

While the earlier phases were represented by pastoral and early village farming communities, the mature Harappan settlements were highly urbanised with organised cities, and a much developed material and craft culture. They also had regular trade with Arabia and Mesopotamia. The Late Harappan phase witnessed large-scale de-urbanisation, drop in population, abandonment of established settlements, lack of basic amenities, violence and even the disappearance of the Harappan script, the researchers say.

"We analysed the oxygen isotope composition in the bone and tooth phosphates of these remains to unravel the climate pattern. The oxygen isotope in mammal bones and teeth preserve the signature of ancient meteoric water and in turn the intensity of monsoon rainfall. Our study shows that the pre-Harappan humans started inhabiting this area along the Ghaggar-Hakra rivers in a climate that was favourable for human settlement and agriculture. The monsoon was much stronger between 9000 years and 7000 years from now and probably fed these rivers making them mightier with vast floodplains," explained Deshpande Mukherjee.

Indus Valley evolved even as monsoon declined

They took their dig to an unexplored site, Bhirrana — and ended up unearthing something much bigger. The excavation also yielded large quantities of animal remains like bones, teeth, horn cores of cow, goat, deer and antelope, which were put through Carbon 14 analysis to decipher antiquity and the climatic conditions in which the civilization flourished, said Arati Deshpande Mukherjee of Deccan College, which helped analyse the finds along with Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad.

The researchers believe that the Indus Valley Civilization spread over a vast expanse of India — stretching to the banks of the now "lost" Saraswati river or the Ghaggar-Hakra river — but this has not been studied enough because what we know so far is based on British excavations. "At the excavation sites, we saw preservation of all cultural levels right from the pre-Indus Valley Civilisation phase (9,000-8,000 years ago) through what we have categorised as Early Harappan (8,000-7,000 years ago) to the Mature Harappan times," said Sarkar.

The late Harappan phase witnessed large-scale de-urbanisation, drop in population, abandonment of established settlements, violence and even the disappearance of the Harappan script, the researchers say. The study revealed that monsoon started weakening 7,000 years ago but, surprisingly, the civilization did not disappear.

The Indus Valley people were very resolute and flexible and continued to evolve even in the face of declining monsoon. The people shifted their crop patterns from large-grained cereals like wheat and barley during the early part of intensified monsoon to drought-resistant species like rice in the latter part. As the yield diminished, the organised large storage system of the Mature Harappan period gave way to more individual household-based crop processing and storage systems that acted as a catalyst for the de-urbanisation of the civilization rather than an abrupt collapse, they say.

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From

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Indus Valley Civilisation Much Older Than Thought

Climate change was probably not the sole cause for the collapse of the Harappan civilisation in the Indus-Ghaggar-Hakra river valleys, say Indian scientists in a breakthrough study, highlighting that the the Harappans “did not give up” despite the decline in the monsoon.

In what may mark a significant shift in the study of the ancient world, new research claims that the Indus Valley civilisation is much older than previously believed [Credit: Dawn]

The recent research by a team of researchers from IIT Kharagpur, Institute of Archaeology, Deccan College Pune, Physical Research Laboratory and Archaeological survey of India (ASI) also shows that the civilisation itself was much older than thought — it is at least 8,000 years old.

“Our study suggests that the climate was probably not the sole cause of Harappan decline. Despite the monsoon decline, the civilisation did not disappear. The people changed their farming practices.

“They switched from water-intensive crops when monsoon was stronger to drought-resistant crops when it was weaker. Our work shows they did not give up despite the change in climate conditions,” said Anindya Sarkar of the Department of Geology and Geophysics, IIT Kharagpur and the lead investigator.

“Our study suggests that other causes, like change in subsistence strategy, by shifting crop patterns rather than climate change was responsible for the Harappan collapse,” Sarkar said.

On the Indian subcontinent, the major centres of this civilisation include Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro in Pakistan and Lothal, Dholavira and Kalibangan in India.

“These people shifted their crop patterns from the large-grained cereals like wheat and barley during the early part of intensified monsoon to drought-resistant species of small millets and rice in the later part of declining monsoon, and thereby changed their subsistence strategy,” explained Sarkar.

The findings come from a major excavated site of Bhirrana in Haryana that shows preservation of all cultural levels of this ancient civilisation from the pre-Harappan Hakra phase through the Early Mature Harappan to the Mature Harappan time.

Bhirrana was part of a high concentration of settlements along the now dried up mythical Vedic river ‘Saraswati’, an extension of Ghaggar river in the Thar desert.

To find out how old the civilisation is, the researchers dated pottery of the Early Mature Harappan time — by a technique called optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) — and found it to be nearly 6,000 years old, the oldest known pottery so far. The levels of pre-Harappan Hakra phase have been dated as old as 8,000 years.

“It is very interesting to investigate how these ancient people coped with the then climate change and can be a lesson for today’s impending disaster of climate change,” said Navin Juyal of Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, who dated the potteries and is a co-author of the paper.