Deciphering the Indus Script

✍ Scribed by Asko Parpola

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Year: 1994
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 392
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Of the writing systems of the ancient world which still await deciphering, the Indus script is the most important. It developed in the Indus or Harappan Civilization, which flourished c. 2500-1900 BC in and around modern Pakistan, collapsing before the earliest historical records of South Asia were composed. Nearly 4,000 samples of the writing survive, mainly on stamp seals and amulets, but no translations. Professor Parpola is the chief editor of the Corpus of Indus Seals and Inscriptions. His ideas about the script, the linguistic affinity of the Harappan language, and the nature of the Indus religion are informed by a remarkable command of Aryan, Dravidian, and Mesopotamian sources, archaeological materials, and linguistic methodology. His fascinating study confirms that the Indus script was logo-syllabic, and that the Indus language belonged to the Dravidian family.

✦ Table of Contents

Title page......Page 1
Contents......Page 3
Figures......Page 5
Tables......Page 10
Preface......Page 11
Credits for illustrations and quotations......Page 14
Abbreviations......Page 16
Part I: Introduction......Page 19
1 The Indus Civilization and its historical contex......Page 21
Part II: The Indus script......Page 45
2. Early writing systems......Page 47
3. Deciphering an unknown script......Page 58
4. Approaches to the Indus script......Page 70
5. Internal evidence for the type of script used in the Indus Valley......Page 86
6. Internal evidence for the structure of the Induslanguage......Page 104
7. External clues to the Indus script......Page 120
Part III: The linguistic context......Page 141
8. In search of the Indus language......Page 143
9. Dravidian languages and the Harappan culture......Page 178
Part IV: Interpretations of Indus pictograms......Page 195
10. The 'fish' signs of the Indus script......Page 197
11. The astronomical and astrological background......Page 216
12. The trefoil motif: further evidence for astral religion......Page 229
13. Evidence for Harappan worship of the god Muruku......Page 243
14. Evidence for Harappan worship of the Goddess......Page 258
15. Epilogue......Page 291
Appendix......Page 297
Bibliographical notes......Page 302
References......Page 321
Index of Indus signsand sign sequences......Page 367
Index......Page 371