Finding the Real Roots of Indian Civilization.
India, today is referred to as a sleeping giant in the modern world; a country that's destined to be the next superpower in the world. Yet, what a lot of people don't realize is that for a long period of history, its civilization was the most culturally, economically and socially rich society in the world. And the question that has been a topic of huge debate for historians who have been researching in this field for ages is "Where did they come from?" The theory that I will be supporting in this theory is the one that states that it was the nomadic Aryans from Central Asia who are the ancestors to this culturally, economically and socially rich civilization. To answer the two questions that I've been asked to answer in this paper, I will take a chronological approach and answer the second part of the question, which asks more about the Indus Valley civilization first. I have divided the paper into two sections, where the first one talks about the Indus Valley Civilization and the second about the Aryan conquests.
The Expansion of the Indus Valley Civilization .
The Indus Valley civilization is one of the most ancient human societies. It had its origins as early as the 7th Millennia BC in a site called Mehrgarh, in modern-day Pakistan. Neolithic sites had been discovered in Baluchistan, which pointed to the fact that the population was indigenous to the region. "Before indigenous sites of earlier stages of the Indus civilization were excavated, it was believed that Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro were merely outposts of the Mesopotamian civilization, these speculations were strengthened by the mention in Mesopotamian sources of countries such as Dilmun, Magan and Meluhha." (Kulke, p.2) This strengthened the theory that the Indus Civilization was a separate, indigenous society and had no origins in ancient Mesopotamia. The Civilization started when the nomads transitioned into settled agriculture life in Baluchistan, simultaneously with that in Iran (ancient Mesopotamia).
