Editing Indus Valley Civilisation (section)

==Pre-Harappan era: Mehrgarh==
{{Main|Mehrgarh}}
{{See also|Neolithic Revolution}}
[[Mehrgarh]] is a [[Neolithic]] (7000&nbsp;BCE to {{Circa|2500&nbsp;BCE}}) mountain site in the Balochistan province of [[Pakistan]],<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4882968.stm|title=Stone age man used dentist drill|date=6 April 2006|via=news.bbc.co.uk|access-date=24 March 2016|archive-date=14 November 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191114065854/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4882968.stm|url-status=live}}</ref> which gave new insights on the emergence of the Indus Valley Civilisation.<ref name="Chandler 34–42" />{{refn|group=lower-alpha|According to [[Ahmad Hasan Dani]], professor emeritus at [[Quaid-e-Azam University]], [[Islamabad]], the discovery of Mehrgarh "changed the entire concept of the Indus civilisation ... There we have the whole sequence, right from the beginning of settled village life."<ref name="Chandler 34–42"/>}} Mehrgarh is one of the earliest sites with evidence of farming and herding in [[South Asia]].<ref>{{cite web |work=UNESCO World Heritage Centre |date=30 January 2004 |url=https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/1876/ |title=Archaeological Site of Mehrgarh |access-date=26 December 2019 |archive-date=3 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201103084357/https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/1876/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last=Hirst |first=K. Kris |date=2005 |orig-year=Updated 30 May 2019 |url=https://www.thoughtco.com/mehrgarh-pakistan-life-indus-valley-171796 |title=Mehrgarh, Pakistan and Life in the Indus Valley Before Harappa |publisher=ThoughtCo |access-date=9 March 2021 |archive-date=29 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201029085959/https://www.thoughtco.com/mehrgarh-pakistan-life-indus-valley-171796 |url-status=live }}</ref> Mehrgarh was influenced by the Near Eastern Neolithic,{{sfn|Gangal|Sarson|Shukurov|2014}} with similarities between "domesticated wheat varieties, early phases of farming, pottery, other archaeological artefacts, some domesticated plants and herd animals."{{sfn|Singh, Sakshi|2016}}{{refn|group=lower-alpha|name="Near East"}}

[[Jean-François Jarrige|Jean-Francois Jarrige]] argues for an independent origin of Mehrgarh. Jarrige notes "the assumption that farming economy was introduced full-fledged from Near-East to South Asia,"{{sfn|Jarrige|2008a}}<!--**START OF NOTE**-->{{refn|group=lower-alpha|name="Near East"|According to Gangal et al. (2014), there is strong archeological and geographical evidence that neolithic farming spread from the Near East into north-west India.{{sfn|Gangal|Sarson|Shukurov|2014}}{{sfn|Singh, Sakshi|2016}} Gangal et al. (2014):{{sfn|Gangal|Sarson|Shukurov|2014}} "There are several lines of evidence that support the idea of a connection between the Neolithic in the Near East and in the Indian subcontinent. The prehistoric site of Mehrgarh in Baluchistan (modern Pakistan) is the earliest Neolithic site in the north-west Indian subcontinent, dated as early as 8500&nbsp;BCE."<ref>Possehl GL (1999). ''Indus Age: The Beginnings''. Philadelphia: Univ. Pennsylvania Press.</ref>}}<!--**END OF NOTE**--><!--**START OF NOTE**-->{{refn|group=lower-alpha|Neolithic domesticated crops in Mehrgarh include more than 90% barley and a small amount of wheat. There is good evidence for the local domestication of barley and the zebu cattle at Mehrgarh,{{sfn|Jarrige|2008a}}{{sfn|Costantini|2008}} but the wheat varieties are suggested to be of Near-Eastern origin, as the modern distribution of wild varieties of wheat is limited to Northern Levant and Southern Turkey.{{sfn|Fuller|2006}} A detailed satellite map study of a few archaeological sites in the Baluchistan and Khybar Pakhtunkhwa regions also suggests similarities in early phases of farming with sites in Western Asia.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Petrie |first1=C.A. |last2=Thomas |first2=K.D. |year=2012 |title=The topographic and environmental context of the earliest village sites in western South Asia |journal=Antiquity |volume=86 |issue=334 |pages=1055–1067 |doi=10.1017/s0003598x00048249 |s2cid=131732322 }}</ref> Pottery prepared by sequential slab construction, circular fire pits filled with burnt pebbles, and large granaries are common to both Mehrgarh and many Mesopotamian sites.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Goring-Morris |first1=A.N. |last2=Belfer-Cohen |first2=A. |year=2011 |title=Neolithization processes in the Levant: The outer envelope |journal=Curr. Anthropol. |volume=52 |pages=S195–S208 |doi=10.1086/658860|s2cid=142928528 }}</ref> The postures of the skeletal remains in graves at Mehrgarh bear strong resemblance to those at [[Ali Kosh]] in the Zagros Mountains of southern Iran.{{sfn|Jarrige|2008a}} Clay figurines found in Mehrgarh resemble those discovered at [[Teppe Zagheh]] on the Qazvin plain south of the Elburz range in Iran (the 7th&nbsp;millennium BCE) and [[Jeitun]] in Turkmenistan (the 6th&nbsp;millennium BCE).{{sfn|Jarrige|2008b}} Strong arguments have been made for the Near-Eastern origin of some domesticated plants and herd animals at Jeitun in Turkmenistan (pp. 225–227).<ref name="Harris DR 2010">Harris D.R. (2010). ''Origins of Agriculture in Western Central Asia: An Environmental-Archaeological Study''. Philadelphia: Univ. Pennsylvania Press.</ref>}}<!--**END OF NOTE**--><!--**START OF NOTE**-->{{refn|group=lower-alpha|The Near East is separated from the Indus Valley by the arid plateaus, ridges and deserts of Iran and Afghanistan, where rainfall agriculture is possible only in the foothills and cul-de-sac valleys.<ref name="Hiebert FT 2002">{{cite journal |last1=Hiebert |first1=FT |last2=Dyson |first2=RH |year=2002 |title=Prehistoric Nishapur and frontier between Central Asia and Iran |journal=Iranica Antiqua |volume=XXXVII |pages=113–149 |doi=10.2143/ia.37.0.120}}</ref> Nevertheless, this area was not an insurmountable obstacle for the dispersal of the Neolithic. The route south of the Caspian sea is a part of the Silk Road, some sections of which were in use from at least 3,000&nbsp;BCE, connecting Badakhshan (north-eastern Afghanistan and south-eastern Tajikistan) with Western Asia, Egypt and India.<ref>Kuzmina EE, Mair V.H. (2008). ''The Prehistory of the Silk Road''. Philadelphia: Univ. Pennsylvania Press</ref> Similarly, the section from Badakhshan to the Mesopotamian plains (the [[Great Khorasan Road]]) was apparently functioning by 4,000&nbsp;BCE and numerous prehistoric sites are located along it, whose assemblages are dominated by the [[Cheshmeh-Ali (Shahr-e-Rey)|Cheshmeh-Ali]] (Tehran Plain) ceramic technology, forms and designs.<ref name="Hiebert FT 2002"/> Striking similarities in figurines and pottery styles, and mud-brick shapes, between widely separated early Neolithic sites in the Zagros Mountains of north-western Iran (Jarmo and Sarab), the Deh Luran Plain in southwestern Iran (Tappeh Ali Kosh and Chogha Sefid), Susiana (Chogha Bonut and Chogha Mish), the Iranian Central Plateau ([[Sang-i Chakmak|Tappeh-Sang-e Chakhmaq]]), and Turkmenistan (Jeitun) suggest a common incipient culture.<ref>Alizadeh A (2003). "Excavations at the prehistoric mound of Chogha Bonut, Khuzestan, Iran. Technical report", University of Chicago, Illinois.</ref> The Neolithic dispersal across South Asia plausibly involved migration of the population.<ref>Dolukhanov P. (1994). ''Environment and Ethnicity in the Ancient Middle East''. Aldershot: Ashgate.</ref><ref name="Harris DR 2010"/> This possibility is also supported by Y-chromosome and mtDNA analyses.<ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Quintana-Murci L, Krausz C, Zerjal T, Sayar SH |display-authors=etal |year=2001 |title=Y-chromosome lineages trace diffusion of people and languages in Southwestern Asia |journal=Am J Hum Genet |volume=68 |issue=2 |pages=537–542 |doi=10.1086/318200 |pmid=11133362 |pmc=1235289}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |vauthors=Quintana-Murci L, Chaix R, Wells RS, Behar DM |display-authors=etal |year=2004 |title=Where West meets East: The complex mtDNA landscape of the Southwest and Central Asian corridor |journal=Am J Hum Genet |volume=74 |issue=5 |pages=827–845 |doi=10.1086/383236 |pmid=15077202 |pmc=1181978}}</ref>}}<!--**END OF NOTE**--> and the similarities between Neolithic sites from eastern Mesopotamia and the western Indus valley, which are evidence of a "cultural continuum" between those sites. But given the originality of Mehrgarh, Jarrige concludes that Mehrgarh has an earlier local background, and is not a "'backwater' of the Neolithic culture of the Near East".{{sfn|Jarrige|2008a}}

Lukacs and Hemphill suggest an initial local development of Mehrgarh, with a continuity in cultural development but a change in population. According to Lukacs and Hemphill, while there is a strong continuity between the Neolithic and [[Chalcolithic]] (Copper Age) cultures of Mehrgarh, dental evidence shows that the Chalcolithic population did not descend from the Neolithic population of Mehrgarh,{{sfn|Coningham|Young |2015|p=114}} which "suggests moderate levels of gene flow."{{sfn|Coningham|Young |2015|p=114}}{{refn|group=lower-alpha|They further noted that "the direct lineal descendents of the Neolithic inhabitants of Mehrgarh are to be found to the south and the east of Mehrgarh, in northwestern India and the western edge of the Deccan plateau," with Neolithic Mehrgarh showing greater affinity with Chalcolithic [[Inamgaon]], south of Mehrgarh, than with Chalcolithic Mehrgarh.{{sfn|Coningham|Young |2015|p=114}}}} Mascarenhas et al. (2015) note that "new, possibly West Asian, body types are reported from the graves of Mehrgarh beginning in the Togau phase (3800&nbsp;BCE)."{{sfn|Mascarenhas |Raina |Aston |Sanghera |2015|p=9}}

Gallego Romero et al. (2011) state that their research on lactose tolerance in India suggests that "the west Eurasian genetic contribution identified by Reich et al. (2009) principally reflects gene flow from Iran and the Middle East."{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=9}} They further note that "[t]he earliest evidence of cattle herding in South Asia comes from the Indus River Valley site of Mehrgarh and is dated to 7,000&nbsp;[[YBP]]."{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=9}}{{refn|group=lower-alpha|Gallego romero et al. (2011) refer to (Meadow 1993):{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=9}} Meadow RH. 1993. ''Animal domestication in the Middle East: a revised view from the eastern margin.'' In: Possehl G, editor. ''Harappan civilization''. New Delhi: Oxford University Press and India Book House. pp.&nbsp;295–320.{{sfn|Gallego Romero|2011|p=12}}}}