2,700 Year Old Yogi in SamadhiFound in Indus Valley Civilization Archaeological Site The 2,700 year old skeletal remains of an ancient yogi sitting in samadhi have been found in an Indus valley civilization archaeological site located at Balathal, Rajasthan. Many Indus Valley seals depict pictures of yogis sitting in lotus position. Here are two examples showing ancient yogis sitting in meditation and keeping their hands on their knees as done in modern yoga meditations. If we see resting on his knees as well. we can note that his fingers are in gyana mudra (with thumb touching index finger). This site.the skeletal remains of the yogi above. Excavation began in 1994 jointly by the . Misra during a survey in 1962-63. was discovered by V. located 6 km from Vallabhnagar town and 42 km from Udaipur city. Balathal is an archaeological site located in Vallabhnagar tehsil of Udaipur district of Rajasthan state in western India. N. The following article provides some information on the archaeological excavations done at Balathal. Udaipur.Department of Archaeology of the Deccan College Post-graduate and Research Institute. Piecing the Ahar Puzzle by Rohit Parihar . Pune and the Institute of Rajasthan Studies. 800 B.500 year old Ahar culture provide clues to the link between the Harappans and their predecessors.Excavation of sites from the 4. cremated their dead. a team of Indian archaeologists excavating the site went on removing layer after layer of civilisation. spread over 500 sq m. But why had they built a fort only to fill it with ash and cowdung? To solve the mystery. They were Mewar’s first farmers. Carbon dating established that they had lived in and around the Mewar region in Rajasthan between 3. comparable to the citadels of the Harappans.500 and 1. And the Harappans buried theirs. This was the first time human skeletons had been found at any Ahar site.000 B. . four in layers between 2. and 1.C. That it existed at all was a surprise – a fortified enclosure of mud and brick. older even than the Harappans. The Ahars. That was the age of stone and copper. it had been thought. They found five skeletons.500 years ago. It was filled with ash and cowdung.800 B. The mystery deepened. the chalcolithic age.C.C. A people called the Ahars had built it in Balathal near modern Udaipur some 4. 500 B. On the scale of civilisation. Harappa’s progress in the mature Harappan period (2.) helped the rural Ahar people to flourish and develop their own township and stone and brick houses. And they may be the missing link to show how the Indus people made such a quantum leap from small rural communities to an advanced civilisation. This village life emerged much before the mature Harappan era.Who Were The Ahars? There are 90 sites of Ahar – a rural society. The recent round of excavations is establishing that Ahar culture and Harappan civilisation were different though contemporary and related. they emerged far ahead of other chalcolithic cultures in the subcontinent.C. . Pune and Institute of Rajasthan Studies. a biological anthropologist from the University of Oregon. Ahar sites have been reported in Udaipur. In modern Rajasthan. Their name comes from a mid-1950s excavation led by R. Dungarpur. one excavation was carried out at Gilund in Rajsamand and then the focus shifted to the Harappans. he suffered from a joint disease and had lost all but four of his teeth at least five years before death. It had been buried with a small earthen lota (pot) near the head. Bundi. Chittorgarh. A few years later. Dead at the age of 50. and it caught the archaeologists’ interest. The third skeleton was of a female approximately 35 years of age. and in undulating rocky plateaus and plains along the Banas river and its tributaries. Gwen Robbins. Tonk and Ajmer dotting10. Rajasthan Vidyapeeth. Why was the .C. Bhilwara. Rajsamand. a left mandible and a few cranial fragments were found to be of a second individual aged 35 whose sex couldn’t be determined. a scholar on Ahar culture. Aggarwal. Rajasthan. Udaipur turned their attention to Ahar culture in 1994 and began excavations in Balathal. And discoveries began pouring in. in her ongoing preliminary analysis of the bones. found the first skeleton uncovered was of a male. The Deccan College. “There is a commonality in all 90-sites located in South eastern Rajasthan and parts of Madhya Pradesh.000 sq km. at Ahar near Udaipur.Ahar culture flourished predominantly in the Mewar region of Rajasthan. On closer inspection of the remains.The fourth was of a 35-year-old woman. former director of archaeology. USA.” says Jaipur-based Rima Hooja. on the eastern side of the Aravallis. Deccan College and the University of Pennsylvania began digging in Gilund in 1999 and the Jaipur circle of Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) began excavation at Ojiyana in Bhilwara in 2000. these figures have been found in abundance indicating it could be a regional shrine of the . from a different era. was of an adult male 35 to 40 years old. At Marmi. a site near Chittorgarh.” The fifth skeleton.N. Mishra. former principal of the Deccan College.” says Dr V.lota there? “I am certain that the fortified enclosure had a ritual function. The ritual of burial in ash and cowdung raises the need to look at related traditions in present-day Hindu communities such as Gosain and Jogi which bury their dead. and had been buried in a seated position that resembles the modern samadhi burial of sadhus who renounce the world. who led the excavations: “You don’t find such selective burials in cow dung and ash anywhere else. Were They Cow Worshippers? The excavations reveal a large number of bull figurines indicating the Ahar people worshipped the bull. ” Other archaeologists suspect them to be bull calves but insist if further studies prove these to be cows. Meena. who undertook the excavation. Discovery of cow-like figurines in Ojiyana. is a very common feature at Balathal. This technique consists of putting a second slip over the earlier (lower) slip on the pot and then removing it in thin bands before it completely dries up.bull cult of this rural population. superintendent.C. This produces various kinds of motifs like straight and wavy bands and crisscross patterns in two colours.400B. one could infer that the cow was a revered animal and the Hindu practice of treating the cow as a holy animal can thus be of pre-Aryan antiquity. But there is evidence that the Ahar people may have had links with Gujarat’s Harappans. There is no other evidence of idol worship or Harappan religious practices like worship of the mother goddess. by the Saraswati. asi Jaipur circle. the first site found on the slope of a hill. “There are no humps and we can see small teats.” . has baffled archaeologists. The Harappans flourished in a far larger area. in Baluchistan and in the relatively semi-arid environment of Kutch and Saurashtra and the sandy south-western plains of Gujarat. says. Did The Harappans Learn From Them? The technique of decoration in pottery known as “reserved slip” which was seen only in a few shards at the Harappan sites of Mohenjodaro and Surkotada in 2. Cow-worship was not a known Ahar practice.R. “These are certainly cows. Shinde of Deccan College: “The Harappans apparently borrowed this technique from Balathal. along the alluvial plains of the Indus and its tributaries. Says V.S.” B. There is evidence of copper melting too. Harappans probably imported copper ores and even finished copper goods from Ahar people. “This. Unlike other chalcolithic cultures which had stone tools. Tan ware. razors and barbed and tanged arrow heads. Probably. Were They The First Planners? If Balathal surprised archaeologists with its skeletons. An unusual discovery last year was a set of six clay pots arranged inside a large clay jar in Balathal. and thin red ware appear only in the “fortification phase” of Ahar civilisation and suggest contact with the Harappans of Gujarat.Speculation about intense fire-modelling activity has been supported by the discovery of kilns at Ahar sites. A sand. The coarse pottery in the earliest levels of excavations confirms that Ahar culture grew independently of Harappans. they had the advantage of access to copper from the Khetri mines and in the nearby Aravalli hills. Even Balathal and Ojiyana had sun-dried mud-brick and .” says Mishra. clay and lime mix was used as plaster. In Balathal. fine deluxe ware of three varieties was found. Of the six pots three are large black-and-red bowls decorated with geometric designs in white. the Aharites made copper tools such as chisels. Gilund has excited them with its massive burnt-brick structures. Balathal apparently imported this ware from other Ahar sites. One of the other vessels contained steatite beads and flowers both of which were used for stringing into necklaces. the blackand-red ware constitute only 8 per cent of the ceramic assemblage whereas in Ahar it is 70 per cent. apparently for hunting. Decorated black-and-red pottery is a mark of Ahar culture distinct from the Harappan where the interiors of vessels was black. is a lady’s jewellery box. mainly dishes and dishes-on-stand very similar to those of the Harappans. In later levels. to me. there are remains of a wall that probably surrounded the residential complex and a fortified structure in the centre of the habitation. Locally available granite and gneiss rock were used in construction and the average size of stone blocks was 25 cm long. capped by mud in case of stone walls and by thatch in case of smaller structures of wooden posts and mud walls. Mud and cow dung were used as plaster – as villagers use them even today.C. though fortification began later. The findings club Ahar sites in the same category as the Harappans who were. mud bricks were often used to raise partition walls.C. In Balathal. it is built over mud-brick platforms. In stone structures. This implies that people knew of stone architecture when the settlement began around 3. There are high-built stone platforms on the eastern edge. The mud bricks were often of the same length but narrow and slimmer. The Balathal and Gilund settlements also show incipient planning with a wide street and a narrow lane dividing the residential complexes. using stone hammers and copper and wooden wedges to remove the stone blocks. people apparently heated rocks with fire to create cracks and poured water to loosen the stones. the 2. Shinde who began excavations at the site with a University of . At Balathal. As the copper tools were too small for quarrying. Gilund had long and wide parallel walls. the only known pre-iron people known to have used these techniques. until now.stone structures and fortifications. and fortification walls are broadened towards the base.500 B. Wooden beams and rafters made the roof. fortification phase reveals a succession of stone structures inside the fortification and below the wall that ran around the residential complex. Like Harappan citadels. 20 cm wide and 15 cm thick.500 B. fowling and fishing. perhaps to extract arrows. Says Shinde: “The Harappans did help them flourish but the farmers retained their culture intact.D. rice was also grown.finger millet and Italian millet. Wild animals such as nilgai and blackbuck constituted 5 per cent. and there are more like it around. common pea. What Happened To Them? Aharites abandoned the sites in 1. stock raising. buffalo only 3 per cent.Pennsylvania team says. on earthen tawas. There was sufficient agricultural surplus to undertake fortifications as in Balathal. “The Harappan model of city planning has a clear impact here. turtle and molluscs were also found. as they are today. it was climatic changes or natural calamities that compelled Aharites to quit farming which might not have remained remunerative in that area. lentil. and lentils and cereals grounded in pounders and querns – handmills of stone. Apparently.” Chairman of the Archaeological Society of India S. Gupta says. Hooja points out that at Ahar. Remains of pig.C. The rotis were made.K. barley. sheep and goat 19 per cent. food cooked on U-shaped chulhas.P. fish.” One complex is of 8. P. it was controlling the settlements around it with its own organisational set-up of a chiefdom-based society but the construction activity was influenced by Harappa. Kajale of the same college found that the cultivated plants included wheat. “Gilund is emerging as an urban centre of the Aharites. Their economies must have been hit by the . hunting.” It was a mixed economy based on farming. Joglekar of Deccan College studied animal remains and found domesticated animals accounted for 73 per cent of bones.. A large number of bones were charred and split open.P. Thomas and P.000 sq ft.800 B. M. a period by when Harappa had also declined. Apparently. In Mewar. hunter-gatherer-herders of the region took to farming and became the forerunners of today’s rural society in southern Rajasthan. when in the Mauryan era. there is a long and continuous history of human habitation. The Ahars aren’t dead. belonged. The odhnis of Gameti women bear a tell-tale resemblance to the trademark red-and-black pottery of Ahar culture. famed in Rajasthani folklore.C. Then there are communities like the Gemetis. So either they left for other places for farming or took to cattle and stock raising. remained unoccupied until 300 B.. the community to which the dancer Gulabo.decline of Harappa too. Mishra says others took to stock breeding and became Gadris (shepherds)and Rabaris (camel breeders). It is around this period’s layer that the fifth skeleton was found. Meghwals and Bawarias who continue to practise their traditional occupation of hunters to this day. Some of them used to eat carrion until a few decades ago. And evidence of the folk religion of the Ahars survives among the Kalbelias. Lalti Pandey of the Institute of Rajasthan Studies says of these people that “they knew of iron smelting and manufactured iron implements”. It seems that influenced by Ahar culture. Balathal. Two iron smelting furnaces have been found in Balathal in this phase. They still live among us. . for example. some people re-occupied the sites.
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