"India is the cradle of human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great grandmother of tradition. Our most valuable and most astrictive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India only! "Mark Twain.

ANCIENT INDIA

India--Location

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India--Location• India is located on the southern side of the continent of Asia in an area often referred to as “South Asia”

• The area is called the Indian Subcontinent because while smooshed into Asia, it is part of a different tectonic plate. Other countries such as Pakistan, Myanmar, Nepal, and Sri Lanka are part, too

• The Himalayas were formed by the collision of the India tectonic plate and the Asia tectonic plate (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDrMH7RwupQ)

• India’s geographical borders have been (historically) mountains and ocean

Indian MountainsPlease use a pencil to mark and label:• Himalayas

• Eastern Ghats

• Western Ghats

• Aravalli• Vindhyas• Satpuras

Indian Rivers and Seas

• Please label the rivers and other bodies of water that Sigrid underlines

Indian Geographical FeaturesMark and label:• Deccan Plateau

• Thar Desert

• Hindu Kush

• Ceylon (now Sri Lanka)

THE INDUS RIVER CIVILIZATIONSThe Beginnings of Indian Civilization

The Indus River Civilization 3300- 1900 B.C.E.

• The early Indus River civilization is a mysterious civilization and one with little continuity.

• It only thrived for several centuries and then disappeared.

• The culture has been named the Harappans after the ruins of the city of Harappa was discovered.

• The Harappans were an agricultural people.

• They developed the concepts of urbanization, metalwork, and writing.

HARAPPAN

CITIES

• Their cities were carefully planned and laid out; they are, in fact, the first people believed to have planned the building of their cities.

• Somewhere between 1800 and 1700 BCE, the Harappan cities and towns were abandoned.

HARAPPAN

WRITING

• Harappan writing seems to be a pictographic script.

• However, no one has figured out how to decipher it or even the language it might be rendering.

• The Harappans were eventually replaced by migrations of Indo-Europeans.

• These Indo-Europeans, however, did not adopt the religious practices of the Harappans.

• These Indo-Europeans, were called the Aryans.

Where did they Come From?

• The Aryans were a tribal and nomadic peoples living in the far reaches of Euro-Asia.

• In the early centuries of the second millennium BCE, they began to migrate southwards in steady conquest into the lands of India, through the passes in the Hindu Kush such as the Khyber Pass.

•The Aryans, were a tough, fierce and war-like people.

•Their religion reflects this and is dominated by a storm-god that enjoys warfare and conquest.

•They were a tribal people ruled over by a war-chief, or raja (the Latin word rex or king comes from the same root word, as does the English word regal).

•The Aryan civilization was a new beginning in Indian culture.

•They built no cities, no states, no granaries, and used no writing.

• Instead, they were a people that organized themselves in individual tribes.

•These tribes spread quickly over Northern India.

INDIAN CULTUREBEGINS

•The culture and religion of the Aryans would be gradually mixed with the indigenous cultures.

•By 200 BCE, this process of mixing and transforming was more or less complete and the culture we call "Indian" was fully formed.