Pre-Historic Past of Gujarat - External Linkages

Nearly 4500 years Before Present (2500 BC) there flourished in the northwest of the subcontinent of India, a river valley civilization, named after the river Indus, on whose banks it developed. It extended far beyond the limits of the river valley, covering an area of 1600 Km by 1100 Km A large part of this civilization extended well into the present day state of Gujarat, almost upto the Gulf of Khambhat It was contemporary to the Sumerian civilization of the Euphrates-Tigris river valley system and the Nile valley civilization of Egypt. The Arabian sea-front of the Indus valley civilization in the delta between 2500 BC and 1700 BC, and at its height of development, carried many walled cities that had citadels on the west and lower towns on the east. These ports had urban, commercial elements, water fronts for loading and unloading cargo, warehouses and even a dock, going by the findings of the archaeologist S.R.Rao at Lothal. The archaeological artifacts reveal a developed culture, social organization and urban development. The presence of many steatite trading seals with a numeral, an animal logo and a script, and weights and measures in chert at a number of sites within the civilization area reveal the external trade relations which are further strengthened by artefacts in Gulf ports like Dilmun, in the Euphrates delta and Egypt. They are indicative of a flourishing maritime trade between the Indus valley ports of Melluha and the ports of Magan, Sumeria, Babylonia and Red Sea ports of Egypt. The ports that find mention are Daybul, Barbaricum, Shah Bandar on the western branch of the Indus delta, Dholavira, Desalpar, Surkotda, on the eastern branch, Kuntasi at the head of the Gulf of Kutch, Kusasthali (Dwaraka), Prabhasa Patan in Kathiawad, Lothal, Hathab, Mehgam and Bhagatrav in the Gulf of Khambhat. Archaeologists believe that the ports in the Kutch and the Ranns were of early Harappan period, while those on the west of Kathiawad were of mid-Harappan times. Lothal, Hathab and Mehgam were ports of the closing phase. Some of them continued to survive in the succeeding Vedic period.