The Indus Script: Texts, Concordance and Tables c4.s8.t3: The 6th criterion: the iconographic motifs

The Indus Script: Texts, Concordance and Tables c4.s8.t3

Language: English

The 6th criterion: the iconographic motifs

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The classification of the iconographic motifs in the Corpus is based on the following oppositions:

iconographic motif : no iconography animate : inanimate moving animate being : unmoving animate being object : design animal : anthropomorph real animal : imagined animal single : group joined animals : composite animal

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A detailed analysis of the iconography of the Indus seals and tablets is in preparation and will be published elsewhere. What we offer here is a broad classification of motifs sufficient for organizing the material into coherent classes: 'unicorn' / urus / bison / zebu / buffalo / markhor / goat / deer / rhinoceros / elephant / tiger / hare / snake / gharial / animal group / joined animals / composite animal / anthropomorph / tree / cult object (variously interpreted as a manger, incense burner or filter) / ship / swastika / other geometric design.

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The 'unicorn' motif is placed first because it is the most common one of the Indus seals. The style of representing this animal in profile, so that just one single horn is shown, has in all probability been borrowed from the art of the ancient Near East. Although this representation undoubtedly has had a mythological explanation and importance in the Harappan religion, the 'unicorn' is likely to be a real animal (probably the urus, or *Bos primigenius*) which actually had two horns. It is in fact sometimes depicted as having two horns, but for the sake of analysis and classification, these two-horned representations have been separated from the 'unicorns' under the immediately following heading of 'urus'. These two headings are followed by other bovids, these by caprids and other cloven-hoofed ruminants.

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An "animal group" consists of two or more natural animals appearing on one object, either separately or forming one scene like the two confronting bisons. "Joined animals" usually have more than one head (as do the three tigers joined into a rhomb in M-295 or the bison which, in addition to its own head, has the head of the 'unicorn' in M-298) or, while composed of two or more animals, may not be complete animals (for example, just the heads and necks of two 'unicorns' are joined with each other and a fig tree and a cult object in M-296).⁷⁹ The "composite animal", again, is a complete beast whose body parts belong to different animals.

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⁷⁹ For the iconography of C-26 and C-41, cf. A. Parpola, The Sumerian 'bull-harp' motif in late Indus seals from Chanhujo-daro (forthcoming). 80 M-303 represents a deviant type, with not only the horns but also the hump of the zebu and a less human face. 81 An exception is Paul Yule, Figuren, Schmuckformen und Täfelchen der Harappa-Kultur, Prähistorische Bronzefunde I: 6, München 1985, 32-34. Yule's analysis is somewhat different in detail. 82 The scene in M-439 to M-441 B is classified as an "animal group" although three anthropomorphs are seen in it. 83 This sketchy list is not exhaustive for the anthropomophic motifs nor is it meant to provide an adequate description of the scenes involved.

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Usually only one type of composite animal is represented in the seals. It has the horns of the zebu, the face of man, the tusks and the trunk of the elephant, the neck and front legs of the goat, the middle body of the 'unicorn', the hind legs of the tiger, and the snake for a tail (cf. M-299 to M-302).80 But in the incised copper tablets of Mohenjo-daro, one can distinguish several composite animals. The composite nature of most of the animals depicted on these copper tablets has rarely been recognized so far.81 The "mastiff" of the excavation reports, for example, is actually a composite animal put together of the zebu (horns), tiger (head and front part of the body) and rhinoceros (back part of the body). In this fashion, we distinguish the following composite animals on the copper tablets (given separate Roman numerals when occurring after one another): buffalo + man + deer (?) + snake (M-504 to 506) / markhor + unicorn (M-543 to 549) / two-headed zebu + tiger (?) + unicorn (M-550) / markhor + camel + buffalo (M-551 to 566) / zebu + tiger + buffalo (M-567 to 570) / zebu + elephant + rhinoceros + snake (M-571) / zebu + tiger + rhinoceros (M-572 to 574) / zebu + camel + rhinoceros + snake (M-575 to 581).

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The "anthropomorph" is another broad category, which lumps together almost82 all the scenes in which any man-like figure is seen. This motif is broadly arranged as follows:83

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sitting anthropomorphic deity / anthropomorphic deity inside a fig tree / "contest": hero fighting with two tigers / man sitting in a tree and a tiger beneath looking at him / tiger-bodied goddess / deity holding by the hand two men who carry uprooted trees / archer / men jumping over a buffalo / man spearing a buffalo / tree-worship / sexual intercourse / religious procession with carried cult objects.