The Indus Civilization (Cambridge History of India, Supplementary Volume) c8.1

c8.1

Before we consider these and other matters in greater detail, and indeed before we approach the general structure of the Indus civilization, something must be said of its antecedents and its cultural environment. Reference has already been made to the villages which were scattered amongst the adjacent Baluchistan hills and are found sporadically upon the river-plain itself. Fieldwork by Sir Aurel Stein, N. G. Majumdar and H. Hargreaves, and more recently by Miss B. de Cardi, Leslie Alcock and A. Ghosh, has hinted at the extent and diversity of these village-cultures, and recensions of the evidence by Stuart Piggott and Donald McCown have indicated that they fall into coherent local assemblages, sometimes of considerable extent. But the scientific examination of the cultures and the classification of them on a sound stratigraphical basis has barely yet begun, and any interpretation of their sequence and interaction is necessarily sketchy and provisional. The summary survey which follows in the next section is mainly that of Piggott, with such slight additions as have accrued from subsequent work.