Raw Materials

Articles on natural resources and raw materials in the ancient Indus civilization

Early Evidence of Bead- Making at Mehrgarh, Pakistan: A Tribute to the Scientific Curiosity of Catherine and Jean- François Jarrige

Jean-Francois Jarrige (1940-2014) and his wife Catherine (b. 1942) were two of the most important archaeologists in the South Asian region, whose excavations at Mehrgarh, the site in Balochistan which predates the ancient Indus civilization by thousands of years, helped determine how far back the development of various traditions found in that and other regional civilizations actually reached.

INAA of agate sources and artifacts from the Indus, Helmand, and Thailand Regions

"Geologically speaking," write the authors, "agate is not a particularly uncommon rock . . .. However, good agate – i.e, that which ancient lapidaries would have found suitable for beadmaking – is not widely available. Nodules of the size and quality required to make Harappan-style long-barrel carnelian beads are, in fact, extremely rare" (p. 177).

A Technique for Determing the Provenance of Harappan Banded Limestone "Ringstones" Using ICP-AES

The author's propose a method to analyze some of the largest artifacts recovered at Indus Civilization (ca. 2600 to 1700 BC) cities in Pakistan and northwestern India, the limestone “ringstones.” This later led to the determination that Harappa's ringstones came from near Dholavira.

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