New Perspectives on the Mauryan and Kushana Periods

Northern Polished Black Ware Culture (700-200 BCE)

The author writes: "As an archaeologist who has focused primarily on the first urbanism of the Indus valley, my interest in the Mauryan and Kushana periods arises from a need to understand what happened in the greater Indus valley after the decline and transformation of the Indus cities. I have never been satisfied with models that argued for a Dark Age lasting over one thousand years from around 1300 BCE to 300 BCE, ending with the rise of the Mauryan Empire.

Image above: By Avantiputra7 (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons