Cemetery H culture
The Cemetery-H culture is a Bronze Age culture that was mainly concentrated around 1700 BC. In the north of the Indus culture (in western Punjab in India and Pakistan ).
Type locality and etymology
The type locality of the Cemetery H culture is in Harappa . The culture was named after a cemetery ( Engl. Cemetery ), located in the excavation area H was of Harappa and funeral urns was crowded.
Temporal position
The Cemetery H culture forms part of the late phase of Harappa (Harappa 4 and Harappa 5). They also belongs to the phase-Punjab , which is one of the three phases, which for the Lokalisierungsära (engl. Localization era are decisive) of the Indus civilization.
Remnants of the Cemetery H culture could be traced back to 1900 to 1300 BC. To be dated. Some experts consider them, along with the Gandhara burial culture and the Ocher-Colored Pottery culture, to be the core of the Vedic civilization .
Distribution area
The main distribution area of the Cemetery-H culture was on the upper reaches of the Indus Chanab , which formed the north-western border, on the Ravi , along the Sarasvati as well as on the Satluj and the Beas . From here it extended further east to the Yamuna and the Ganges ( Doab ). Ceramic remnants of the Cemetery H culture have been found in northern Pakistan as far as the Swat area , where mixing with local styles can be observed.
description
Some of the salient features of the Cemetery H culture include:
- Cremation of the deceased. Remnants of bones were kept in painted ceramic urns. The Cemetery H culture thus differs fundamentally from the Indus culture, which buried its deceased in wooden coffins . The urn burials and burials in wooden coffins took place roughly at the same time.
- Red ceramics on which antelopes , peacocks , etc. or sun and star motifs were painted with black paint . Different surface treatments were used on older specimens. This very symbolic style of decoration found widespread use and established a new handicraft tradition.
- Rice now became the staple food. Until about 2200 BC In the late Harappa phase, mainly winter crops such as wheat and barley were grown. Rice was now grown in the summer during the monsoons .
- Clay bricks continued to be used to build houses .
- Breaking off trade relations. Apparently, in the course of the Cemetery H culture, there was a partial collapse of the trade network established during the Indus culture, as popular materials such as sea shells imported from the Indian Ocean were no longer sold. The connections to the Indian Ocean and to the western and north-western highlands ( Pakistan and Afghanistan ) were obviously severed. Decorative pearls made of lapis lazuli and turquoise from Afghanistan are now rarely found in the settlements, the same applies to carnelian from Kutch and Gujarat ; Sea shells for jewelry and ritual objects also disappeared. In addition, characteristic stone drills for working hard stone beads are now missing.
- In return, the production of faience was refined and glass was also produced - both possibly as compensation for missing raw materials such as lapis lazuli, turquoise, shells and carnelian. Faience, which is similar to Lapis Lazuli, served as a substitute for dark blue stone beads. Shiny, red-orange pearls were made from glass, which in turn replaced the missing carnelian. Faience was also used to create white pearls and pendants as imitations of real mussel shells. These technical innovations reflect a creative environment that was created by the demand for status symbols from an urban upper class.
- Physiological studies show that the people of the Cemetery H culture have clear affinities with the people of the Indus culture.
The practice of cremation was a novelty in India. The Vedas also refer to this, for example in the Rigveda (RV 10, 16, 14) they mention ancestors who were buried both burnt (agnidagdha) and unburned (anagnidagdha). The different burial methods and the new ceramic style not only required a change in the religious ideas of the people of the time, but also new economic and political forms of organization. However, this change was of a gradual nature. A certain ideological continuity can be seen in the jewelry, which survived in a “new guise” despite the supply crisis. This could mean that the elite of the late Harappa period emerged from ancestral communities in Harappa itself or resulted from a synthesis of local and alien elements.
Settlements
Even if no large area excavations have yet been carried out, so far known settlement patterns suggest that a three- or four-layer settlement hierarchy and urban centers continued to exist. The archaeologist Kenoyer points out that the Cemetery H culture, compared to the Indus culture, only brought about a shift in the focus of the settlement organization and not - as is so often claimed - a cultural break, a decay of urban culture, an invasion of foreigners or a Leaving the original settlement area is due.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Jonathan Mark Kenoyer: The Indus Valley tradition of Pakistan and Western India . In: Journal of World Prehistory . tape 5 , no. 4 , 1991, pp. 1-64 , doi : 10.1007 / BF00978474 .
- ↑ Jim G. Shaffer: The Indus Valley, Baluchistan and Helmand Traditions: Neolithic Through Bronze Age . In: RW Ehrich (Ed.): Chronologies in Old World Archeology . 3. Edition. 2 volumes. University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1992, pp. I: 441-464, II: 425-446 .
- ↑ Sasanka Sekhar Sarkar: Ancient Races of Baluchistan, Panjab, and Sind . 1964.
- ^ JP Mallory, DQ Adams: Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture . Fitzroy-Dearborn, London and Chicago 1997, ISBN 1-884964-98-2 .
- ↑ Amar Singh Dudi: Ancient India History . Neha Publishers and Distributors, 2012, ISBN 978-93-8031816-5 , Ch. 9. Vedic Religion, Rituals.
- ↑ Jonathan Mark Kenoyer: Cultures and societies of the Indus Tradition . 2006.
- ↑ Jonathan Mark Kenoyer: Urban Process in the Indus Tradition: A preliminary model from Harappa . In: Richard H. Meadow (ed.): Harappa Excavations 1986–1990: A multidisciplinary approach to Third Millennium urbanism . Prehistory Press, Madison, WI 1991, pp. 29-60 ( archive.org ).