Harappan Civilization In The Indus Valley

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A Non-state Harappan Civilization in the Indus Valley The Harappan in the Indus Valley along with Mesopotamia and Egypt could be undeniably regarded as prehistory civilizations demonstrated by archaeological discoveries: evidence such as the sophisticated architecture, the mastery of complex technologies, the writing system, and the high level sociocultural development. However, unlike contemporary Mesopotamia and Egypt, the Harappan civilization in the Indus Valley has its distinctive features which do not conform to the conventional notion of a state. This essay will focus on three features, first the rapid emergence and demise of the Harappan civilization, second the writing system rather than developed literacy, and lastly the lack of evidence of major monumental buildings, contrast them with Mesopotamia and Egypt to argue that the Harappan civilization in the Indus valley is not a state level society. A state level society has a complexity of organization enabling the state to effectively govern large aggregations of people, and the monopoly of authority to protect its inhabitants from invasion . To form a cohesive, powerful and effective state I assume it would take a rather extensive period of time. As we know that the unification of Dynastic Egypt was a result of long period of conquest and alliance among the chiefdoms. Eventually it became a centralised and powerful state. However, we know little about how and why the large urban settlements happened in the Indus Valley during 2500 to 1900 BC, what we do know is the urbanization in the Indus Valley was rapid. Within a few centuries, two large sites the Harappan and Mohenjo-Daro were established and then inexplicably collapsed. As a result of the rapidness of emergence, one plausible argument might be that the harappan has not developed a powerful and well organized state structure. Therefore the

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