Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c7.s1.1

c7.s1.1

Both Harappa and Mohenjo-daro were planned fortified cities. The citadel consisted of a high rampart wall (*Prākāra*) on broad foundation of mud-work 45 ft. wide (*Vapra*), city-gates (*Dvāra*) and a moat (*Parikhā*) for which the Indus and the Ravi sufficed. The main city was enclosed inside these defences, giving a complete picture of what in the Vedic texts and later was known as Pur, a fortified city. The high acropolis is a parallelogram, 400-500 yards north-south by 200 300 yards east-west, with a perimeter of about 3 miles. The city-wall tapering upwards had bastions or towers at intervals (*Aṭṭālaka*) and was itself propped by a revetment of baked bricks 4 ft. wide on the outside (*Iṣṭakā-Prākāra*).