Harappa is one of the biggest archaeological discoveries amongst the Indus Valley civilizations. The city of Harappa was a part of the Indus Valley Civilization that covered most parts of the present day Pakistan and some parts of North-western India. The culture of this region is now known as the Harappan Civilization. While the earliest roots of the Indus Valley Civilization date to approximately 6000 B.C, historians believe that the cities of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro date to around 2600 B.C. These towns were quite advanced and unique in their approach to town planning with their extent of spread much bigger than the Mesopotamian and Egyptian civilizations combined. The Indus Valley civilization was largely agrarian and trade based with its traders having strong business links with Sumer, Mesopotamia. The seals discovered at most of the locations in Harappa led experts to believe that the Harappan civilization may have been economically inclined to trade and agriculture. The people of this civilization were also literate and skilled in workmanship as evident from the seals, which were made of steatite (the dominant material), silver and copper for possible reasons ranging from trade to worship. This paper will argue that the Harappans were a dynamic trading community that might have been involved in both domestic, as well as cross-border trade with the material of the seal determining an owners status in the Harappan society.
Authorship of the Seals
One of the seals uncovered by Marshall was the “Proto-Siva” seal. Doris Srinivasan argues that the seal got its name due to its similarity with the images of Lord Siva as Pasupatinath of the later era of Hinduism. If one takes a look at the “Proto-Siva” seal, one is perplexed again because this seal is a little out of place with the other seals bearing animal motifs. The question that one can also ask is if there were artists who were specialized in the art of making the “Proto-Siva” seal that stood in marked contrast to the majority of the animal motif seals. One could guess that a specific group of artists or a community might have been in charge of making these seals. In the ancient civilizations of India, credit for any work of art was given to the community or a group rather than to individual persons. Geoffrey Cook argued that the maker of these seals had limited skills at depicting perspective, due to which some of the animals appear as though they were unicorns, but in reality the second horn is masked by the first one, so they are actually bovine creatures.
Therefore, one can understand that the seal maker must have been a semi-skilled person working in a community with different persons specialized in different types of seals. Further, while they were quite good at authoring the designs, they had a limited perspective due to which some of the depictions on the seals are not very clear.
Worldview of the Author
One can understand from the wide range of motifs that the author or the seal maker was greatly influenced, possibly, by the prevailing natural scenes in those times as well as through possible religious imagery. Alternatively, MacGregor argues that the person who made these seals was most likely making it for families that were involved in carrying out business and trade across borders. These experts feel that the seals might have been used by these business families as a method of identification of goods and merchandise. Therefore, the author feels that these seals may have had economic usage.
The seal maker’s usage of animals also denotes the way of thinking of most civilizations in ancient India. For instance, each animal depicted on the seal also represents certain human qualities. For instance, the bull represents virility, strength and leadership. Similarly, elephant and water buffalo were domesticated animals that most of the seal makers saw on a daily basis throughout town that, in turn, might have inspired them to inscribe these animals on seals. Likewise, the unicorn seal could have been a representation of a domesticated animal of the bovine family that might have existed in those times. However, due to the imposed archaeological limitation of the inability to read these languages, one cannot understand the differences between the seals. Therefore, to that extent, one’s understanding of the worldview of these seal makers is also limited.
With the demise of the Indus Valley civilization, the Harappan culture also came to an end. Therefore, the Harappan seals did not have any relevance for people that inhabited that region after this period. As a result, at present, the Harappan seals and other artifacts only have a status as relics and archaeological discoveries of another period.
Economy of Harappa
One can gain a lot of information about the economy of Harappa from the steatite seals as well as other aspects of the Harappan towns. Thomas Trautmann, a historian and a professor in history at the University of Michigan, had mentioned that these seals might have been used by people to identify the specific trader who used to deal in specific goods. The location of the seal at the site of excavation led experts to believe that most of these seals had economic usage. Geoffrey Cook stated that the house, from which some of these seals were found, possibly, belonged to someone of wealth and power leading to the conclusion that these seals might have had applications in trade and commerce. This information tells us that the Harappans were, in fact, a vibrant trading community that might have been involved in active trade and commerce locally, as well as with countries across borders. As Trautmann mentions, the Harappans might have also been involved in sea trade with the Mesopotamians as well as the Elamites.
The use of agrarian and bovine animals on seals (water buffalo, goat, sheep and hump-less bull) might also lead one to surmise that agriculture was an important part of the Harappan economy. Therefore, it is possible that the Harappan people may have dealt in trading of agricultural products with other regional economies.
These seals may have had the purpose of identifying the mother country of the trader as well as the origin and type of the commodity. In addition, Jane McIntosh adds that several such steatite seals had been excavated by archaeologists in Harappa. The high numbers of seals found in Harappa point to the fact that the economy of Harappa might have been a booming one with an active trading system that used these seals as markers. This became apparent since the seals are in a single language that indicated a strong local trade. Trautmann too expects that multi-lingual seals when found would reveal the exact nature of cross-border trade routes that were prevalent in those times.
Materials of the Seals
One can see seals at Harappa made of three different materials, namely Steatite, Silver and Copper. Of these, one can find abundance of steatite seals while very few examples of silver and copper seals are also seen.
The reason for the Harappan people adopting steatite as a primary material for making this seals may have been the cost factor. While metals such as copper and silver have an intrinsic value, in that they can be melted and reused, the cost of obtaining, refining and making seals out of these metals have been prohibitive. The fact that few metal seals existed points to the fact that the owners of such seals may have been wealthier as compared to the users of the steatite seals. This differentiation of materials for making seals points to the fact that owner status was a prime factor in the usage of either steatite or metals.
The implications of relying on steatite might have been that in the event of an owner losing his specific seal it could be easily remade without much cost to the owner. On the other hand, it might have been expensive for someone who lost one’s metal seal to have it remade. The second factor could be that while metals corroded or changed color due to climate conditions, fired steatite or soft stone when treated with alkalis would have been relatively more durable than metals. The production methodology and the associated durability of the process may have been the reason for the seals surviving till the present day. In mass producing seals, the cost of a steatite seal would have been much lower than metal seals. Therefore, by relying on cheaper and readily available materials the Harappans could keep the costs of the seals low while using metals elsewhere for other applications, except in cases where the owner of a seal was wealthy enough to afford a metal seal.
Religion in Harappa
The inability to decode the language has proved to be a barrier in the interpretation of the religion practiced in the Indus civilization. However, Trautmann argued that one must not be tempted to assume that the contents of historic Hinduism could be completely used in interpreting the Harappan civilization. He believed that many religious aspects of Indus civilization might pre-date those of historic Hinduism. Therefore, one risks misinterpreting several aspects of the Indus civilization if one applies concepts and facts of historic Hinduism to the Harappan artifacts. For instance, Trautmann believed that the female terracotta figurines could possibly depict either the Mother Goddess or toys for children. The proto-Siva form, for instance, affirms the fact that the Harappans worshipped a form of Siva that was quite close to the historic Pasupatinath. Therefore, at present, one can understand that there is no clear consensus on the religion of the Indus civilization. Most experts can only think of varying interpretations, but in the absence of knowledge of the Harappan script it becomes nearly impossible to get more details on the religion of Harappa.
However, despite this note of caution, Trautmann does draw some parallels with historic Hinduism, possibly because there are no other comparable alternatives.
Conclusion
Despite the problems faced by experts in deciphering the language on the seals, one can conclude that the seals may have had primarily economic usage. The symbols on the seals, as well as their location, point to the fact that these seals were likely used by business families and traders. The varied script on the seals also gives credence to the fact that these seals might have been used as an identification mark for merchandise that was exported by traders. Further study also reveals that metal seals might have been used by the wealthier traders, while steatite seals may have been used by other traders due to the differences in costs of making both these seals. Given the fact, that one cannot rely on traditional Hindu symbolic interpretations to decipher the language on the seals; one can conclude that the seals have an economic usage.
All these facts, collectively, point to the fact that the Harappans were a dynamic trading community that might have been involved in both domestic, as well as cross-border trade with the material of the seal
Bibliography
Cook, Geoffrey. A Unicorn Seal. From Sumer to Meluhha: Contributions to the Archaeology of South and West Asia. 1994. http://www.harappa.com/seal/sealtext.html
MacGregor, Neil. Indus Valley – Seals. The British Museum – Ancient India Section. 2014. http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/highlights/highlight_objects/asia/s/indus_seal.asp x.
McIntosh, Jane. The Ancient Indus Valley: New Perspectives.Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2008.
Shinde, Vasant, et.al. Basic Issues in Harappan Archaeology. Ancient Asia. Vol 1 (2006): 63 – 72. http://www.ancient-asia-journal.com/article/view/8.
Srinivasan, Doris. The So-Called Proto-śiva Seal from Mohenjo-Daro: An Iconological Assessment. Archives of Asian Art. 29 (1975): 47 – 58. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20062578
Trautmann, Thomas. India: Brief History of a Civilization. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
