The Indus Civilization (Cambridge History of India, Supplementary Volume) c14.3

c14.3

In considering the possible implements of war, we may reject the simple chert blades which occur abundantly on all Harappan sites (pl. XXIVb), as on many others of the same general period. But alongside these are found metal implements of which a majority may have been used equally by the soldier, the huntsman, the craftsman, or even by the ordinary householder, and are included in this section without prejudice. They are of copper or of bronze generally poor in tin, and include spears, knives, short swords, arrowheads and axes. It has been suggested that small domed pieces of copper, each perforated with two holes, were sewn on to a garment and used as an equivalent to mail,¹ but there is no supporting evidence and neither body-armour nor helmets (well known in Early Dynastic Sumer), nor indeed shields,² can at present be attributed to the Harappans. Spears are invariably tanged and cannot clearly be distinguished from knives. Most of them are thin, flat, leaf-shaped blades which would buckle on impact and must have been stiffened by being set back between the split ends of the shaft, which would thus serve as a midrib. Sometimes two small holes near the base of the blade suggest a former binding for such a device. Rarely (in four instances) the blade has a slight median thickening, the section being diamond-shaped (fig. 10, 12). Such reinforced blades are up to 18½ in. in length and may rather represent short swords or dirks, a type of weapon for which there is no other evidence. They are from late levels, and have parallels of *c.* 2200–1750 B.C. in Syria and Palestine.³ The leaf-shaped spearhead is universal; no barbed blade has been found, although there is a clear illustration of a barbed spear on a Mohenjo-daro seal, and a barbed spearhead from Ur has been cited in this connexion.⁴