Cities, Towns, and Villages in the Diverse Environments of the Indus Civilization

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Regional Settlement Networks Analysis: A Global Comparison" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The urban phase of South Asia’s Indus Civilization (ca. 2600–1900 BC) does not offer simple parallels to other contemporary complex societies. This paper will present new insights into Indus settlement networks and the diversity of Indus urbanism. There were apparently only four large-scale (80+ ha) Indus settlements, which were polycentric, with walls and platforms demarcating distinct zones, and characterized by large- and small-scale public and private buildings, heterarchical social structures, communal activities, and collective action. These cities were considerable distances apart and situated in different ecological zones within the greater region occupied by Indus populations, and the majority of the population appears to have lived in medium- and small-sized rural settlements in the intervening areas. Significantly, it appears that urban and rural dynamics took different forms in each region, and Indus cities and their relationships with their rural hinterlands transformed over time. There is evidence for different interactive dynamics in “upstream” and “downstream” locations in the Indus River Basin, and settlement instability and population mobility between sites situated in marginal areas characterized by unpredictable access to groundwater. Change, displacement, and mobility all thus appear to have played important roles in the dynamism, transformation, and longevity of Indus settlement networks.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)   •
• Regional Settlement Networks Analysis: A Global Comparison

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 32369