Prehistoric India to 1000 B.C. c13.4

c13.4

But an intimation of what occurred to break this long seclusion of peaceful, if stagnant, communities is to be found in the stratification of the Rana Ghundai mound. Here there had been continuous occupation of the site accompanied by an evolving pottery style from a time likely to be late in the fourth millennium up to one more or less contemporary with some part of the Harappā civilization, the RG IIIc phase, perhaps about 2000 B.C. At this point there is evidence that the settlement was sacked and burnt – ‘everywhere overlying the foundation level ... [of the RG IIIc phase] there are pockets of ashes, as though some great conflagration had taken place’, wrote Brigadier Ross in his description of the stratification of the site. Above this burnt layer, in the RG IV phase, the pottery types show a complete break from those below - coarse bowls appear with painted ornament, ‘bold and not altogether unpleasing in a somewhat tawdry style’. And this settlement was once more destroyed by fire, and again in RG V a change in pottery shows new folk settling on the ancient, flame-scorched Rana Ghundai tell; the pottery is now unpainted, with relief patterns encrusted on to its surface.