The Great Bath o f Mohenjo Daro

1. QuAesTio:How was life in the indian subcontinent different before and after the collapse of the Indus Valley civilization?NuncAgEnda: Compare the laws of Hammurabi and Moses with your partner

13. The Great Bath of MohenjoDaro

14. Indus Valley Civilization • 3300 BCE - 1300 BCE • Advanced, organized, urban (city-like) • Planned cities • Multistory houses • Indoor plumbing • Standard system of weights and measures • Major cities = Harappa & MohenjoDaro • Very little preserved writing • Traded with Egypt, Mesopotamia, South India, Tibet (How do we know?)

18. What happened? • 1900 - 1300 BCE: Civilization in decline • Writing stops • low quality pottery and building • cities abandoned, population decreases • Theories • Aryan Invasion • Deforestation • Flood • Earthquake

24. "Pure in her course from the mountains to the ocean, alone of streams Saraswatihath listened.”-Rig Veda

27. The Aryan Migration into India • Around 1500 BCE Indo-European nomads from Central Asia migrated into Iran, Asia Minor, and India • Indus Valley Civilization went into decline at the same time, so historians once believed that the Aryans invaded and conquered India • The evidence now points to a slow migration and process of acculturation, or combining of cultures

31. The Vedas: Our Best Source • The Vedas are four religious texts of the Indo-Aryans, written in Sanskrit • They are our best source of information for this period so it is called the Vedic Period • They began as oral traditions that were added to over centuries and eventually written down • The earliest, the Rig Veda, was composed during the centuries that the Aryans migrated to India • It describes a semi-nomadic culture that mainly raised cattle, and also mentions horse-drawn chariots and bronze weapons • Compared to the great Indus Civilization that preceded it, Aryan India was much simpler

33. Acculturation • The original inhabitants of the Indian Subcontinent were Dravidians, a darker skinned people who spoke languages like those of South India today • The Aryans slowly adopted the settled agricultural lifestyle of the Dravidians and intermarried • Aryan culture became dominant, with warrior tribal chiefs, or rajahs, ruling populations

34. Acculturation • Once iron arrived in India, the Aryans were able to clear more land for farming, and spread East across the plain surrounding the Ganges River • Aryans divided society into four castes, or levels, and included the non-Aryans in the lowest caste

37. Religious Beliefs • Rig Veda describes the many gods of the Aryans, imported from Indo-European tradition • Indra was the main god, the god of war and of thunder • Agni was the god of fire and the messenger between humans and gods • Mithra was a god found in many Indo-European cultures from Persia to Rome

38. Religious Beliefs • The Rig Veda also taught that all the many gods were actually manifestations, or versions, of the One Ultimate God, called Brahman • Dravidian gods, like those of the Indus Civilization, more commonly included female figures, as well as animal gods, which were included among the Aryan gods but given a lower position

39. CASTE SYSTEM • Work in groups to examine the documents relating to the Caste System, discuss the questions that follow AS A GROUP, and record your answers.

40. PENSAStudents will read Chapter 3 Section 2 and study that content, especially vocabulary words, for a quiz first thing tomorrow!