The Indus Civilization c10.17

c10.17

The people of the Indus valley, or at least a large proportion of them, were undoubtedly flesh-eaters, for the remains of the stag, buffalo, pig, turtle, goat, and ox, and of various kinds of fish have all been found at Mohenjo-daro, although it is possible, as is mentioned later, that the horns of the first-named were ground up and used as medicine. The fowl was also domesticated, for its bones have been found in the Indus cities, but whether this bird is the same as the one that appears in the script is problematical, for the wild jungle-fowl doubtless once roamed the forests of Sind. It is in the large storage jars, sometimes used as larders, that the bones of oxen, sheep, and goats have mostly been discovered, but it is impossible to tell whether flesh was an every-day dish or reserved for special occasions. The fact that many of the animals, whose bones we have found, appear on the seals, and therefore may have been sacred, does not preclude the possibility that they were sometimes eaten at religious festivals. A bronze figure of a goat tied by the neck to a stump undoubtedly represents a sacrificial animal, and, as I have already stated, that animal is still widely used for this purpose in modern India.