The Indus Civilization (Cambridge History of India, Supplementary Volume) c17.92

c17.92

A remarkable series of gold beads was included in an important hoard of jewellery found at Mohenjo-daro in the HR Area. It lay at a depth of only 6 ft. from the surface and was therefore presumably late, although "the rolled up condition of some of the gold ornaments" suggested to the excavator that the hoard "was the property of a goldsmith, who kept it by him until he had enough material to warrant re-melting".³ Individual beads may therefore be of appreciably earlier date. The most notable type is a flat disk with an axial tube (fig. 13, 8), a form which is natural to metal but is also copied in faïence (fig. 13, 9) and is identical with Sumerian beads of Early Dynastic III—Akkadian date (*c.* 2500–2300 B.C.).⁴ The type occurs consistently at Troy at the end of IIg, about 2300 B.C.⁵ The gold examples may be an importation into the Indus valley, but the faïence copies are perhaps more likely to be of local manufacture (fig. 13, 9).