Heritage: oral traditions of Indus Valley

[Gul Agha <agha@CS.UIUC.EDU>]

"Thus, phenomena like the Late Harappan [2nd millenium BC, after the
decline of the urban Indus Valley or Harappan civilization] represent
village cultures which have inherited certain crafts and techniques as
well as a large corpus of oral tradition from the preceding urban
stage.  One of the real strengths of such cultures is their wealth of
traditional history and lore which can also be augmented with fresh
formulations.

Whether the Vedic traditions belong to the Late Harappan Phase or not,
traditions of this general kind did belong to such cultural forms.
Pundit Madho Swarup Vats, the excavator of Harappa, tried to see Vedic
concepts and rituals dealing with life after death in the painted
panels on burial jars from Late Harappan Cemetery H (Vats 1940).  The
same concepts can be traced to Avestan traditions when considering
Namazga VI (Masson and Sarianidi 1972).

In fact, the roots of various iconographic forms emerging in the
plastic art of the later traditions (e.g. Brahmanic icons of Siva and
non-Brahmanic icons of Vrishabha [bull], Naga [serpent], and Yaksha)
may be traced back to oral traditions.  These were, of course,
codified, but at a very late date, in the two great epics the Ramayana
and the Mahabharata as well as in the Puranas and the Jakatas.

Marshall had a point when he traced the origin of water, tree and
animal worship in Hinduism of historical times to the Harappan complex
(Marshall 1931).  While making this suggestion, he was well aware of
the archeological gap in the two urban cycles; but he bridged this by
drawing attention to the continuity of oral tradition."

           -- S.P. Gupta, "The Late Harappan: A Study in Cultural
                     Dynamics" in Possehl (ed) Harappan Civilization
                     1982 American Institute of Indian Studies.

[the para breaks are mine -- put in for readability, the orig is one
para].

sadaaiin ggaddu,

Gul Agha