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Ancient Indus

Brief History

  • Started in 2300 BC

    • Had four main civilizations

      • Harappan 

      • Aryan

      • Mauryan

      • Gupta

    • Each one made India what it is today

      • From their achievements to the wars that were fought

Geography

  • Mostly a flat area

  • Had a dry climate

  • Had two main rivers

    • Indus River

    • Sarasvarti River

  • To the South of Indus is the Arabian Sea

    • Which the rivers flowed to

Economy

  • Traded with other cultures

  • Gupta

    • His area grew

    • As it grew their economy grew as well

    • Believed strict social cast system kept the social structure stable

    • Remained strong until the Han took over

  • Harappan

    • Traded from southern India all the way to Mesopotamia

      • Traded things like pottery, stamps and seals, and even statues

  • Aryan

    • Farmed and their agriculture was the major things they mainly focused on

  • Mauryan

    • Farmers paid heavy taxes to their government

Social Structure

  • Hinduism

    • The Varnas

      • Brahmins

        • Brahmins were the hightest in the social structure and were Indian's priest

      • Kshatriyas

        • Next on the social structure was the Kshatriyas or the rulers or warriors

      • Vaisyas

        • Third on the social structure was the Vaisyas or the Farmers, Craftspeople, and Traders

      • Sudras

        • At the very bottom of their social structure was the Sudras or the Workers and Servants

Government

  • Harappan

    • Historians think that the Harappans had a king and a strong central government

  • Aryan

    • Was governed by a rajas

      • A ruler who ruled a village and the land around the village

      • People would farm for the raja and more for the raja 

      • Sometime diffrent rajas would not get along

        • So there were fights between the two rajas

  • Mauryan

    • Known to have a complex government

      • Had an army of 600,000 soldiers for fights

        • Rode into battle on elephants and even chariots

      • Farmers would pay lots of heavy taxes to the government

  • Gupta

    • The kings decided to us a caste system which strengthened their rule 

      • Yet this was not good for the women was not good for the women cause their jobs were very limited

Beliefs/Religion

  • Harappan

    • Scientist know they have religion but due to not that much clues to their religion they don't know that much about their religion

  • Aryan

    • They had no single ruling

      • Instead a group would have their own seperate leaderwho was most often a skilled warrior

        • Villlages lead by what were called a Raja

          • A person who was a leader who ruled a village and all the land around it

  • Mauryan

    • Focused mainly on Buddhism

  • Gupta

    • Hinduism was their main religion

 

Advancements/Achievements

  • Buddhist temples

    • Some carved out of mountain sides

  • Art

    • Painting 

      • They painted not that many things but the things they did paint include their kings

      • Colorful paintings of people like every day people

    • Statues

      • Many statues were made for Buddist cave temples

      • Had hand carved collums

      • Statues of also their gods

  • Literater

    • Sanskit was the main language of the ancient Aryans

      • Durning the Mauryan and Gupta was when many of the Sanskit was created

  • Metallurgy

    • Pounding metal into works of art

  • Hindu-Arabic numberals

    • First to discover zero

    • What we use today for our numbering system

  • Inoculation

    • Is the practice of injecting a person with a very small dose of a virus to help them build up their defense to the desease

      • We still us this today

Architecture

  • Harappan

    • They were great at city planning

      • There are 2 cities they made that were more than 300 miles apart

      • The Harappans were great engineers due to the evidence of their cities

      • Both of the cities would have a towering fortress to protect the village

      • The city was made of right angle streets and were then linked by buildings

      • They even had a sewer system that prevented the streets from flooding when there was a flood

        • Which means plumbing for the Harappan

  • Aryan 

    • While moving alot they finially settled into villages 

      • They built same villlages but didnt have huge cities

    • So they usually live in small communities

  • Mauryan

    • Focused on making their empire bigger, richer, and stronger

  • Gupta

    • Like Mauryan then expanded alot

    • The empires were know to look beautiful

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