Mystery Behind the Decay of Indus Valley Civilization

History’s claws go deeper than the oceans and higher than the sky. Talking about India’s past, most of our country’s rich culture and heritage has faded away into darkness. However, some of them are being archived in our memories and the internet deserves all the credits. One such unsolved mystery dates back to the disappearance of Indus Valley Civilisation.

Read about the discovery of the Mohenjo-Daro.

• The amazing story of the discovery of Mohenjo-Daro

A Little Background on Indus Valley Civilisation

Mohenjo-Daro wasn’t just an imaginary place in a motion picture. Back in the 3300 B.C.E, one of the oldest civilizations existed where Pakistan, Afghanistan and a little northwestern India rest now. On the banks of the river, Indus were two famously beautiful cities named Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro.

Most of the culture was dug up by archaeologists in the 19^th and 20^th centuries. However, there are no living proofs. Why, you ask? The answer is an absurd one. The whole human-development seemed to have disappeared into thin air.

Analytical and conclusive as we are, we did not back down without an explanation. So, we created possible stories of the collapse of Indus Valley Civilisation. 

Could it Be a War?

A bunch of chroniclers decided upon warfare to be the end of it. Ranging from 3300 BCE – 1300 BCE, the civilization coincides with the Rig Veda (1500 BCE). These sets of poems narrate a story of foreign invaders conquering Indus cities. Trotting back the timeline to the 1940s, archaeologist Mortimer Wheeler unearthed 39 dead bodies from the area. 

Wheeler believed that the remains confirm his theory of Aryan invasion. Aryans were Indo-European people who were considered to have marched up to the Indus development. 

However convincing the story may seem to be, historians still have a problem believing this. Mostly because there have been no discoveries or proofs of mass murders or major weapons. Hence, this theory was ruled out and dumped into the trash. 

Major Climate Change?

Much like what the movie, Mohenjo-Daro, depicted, this theory rests upon the climate change reasons. As victims of climate change ourselves, we can vividly imagine the events that might have unfolded. Some annalists promulgated that the earthquakes resulted in the course change of the Indus River. 

Nearly all great cities of that time were located around the stream. We can only visualize how horrific an incident it must have been.  Sometime around the century, another river named Ghagger Hakra parched. Therefore, people had to relocate abandoning the cities nearby. 

The Ultimate Decline

With what was left of the human race in the Indus Valley Civilisation, suffered a great deal of loss. The floods had left the soil salty and unfit for cultivation. Finally, the rest of the homo sapiens are suspected to have died of starvation. 

As a result of the major incidents, the crop yields lessened and finally ended the trade with foreign countries. This probably stands as the third possible reason for the slow decay of Indus Valley Civilisation. After the extensive study of the possible causes, what do you think? What led the civilization to the brink of collapse?