The Aryan invasion of the Land of Seven Rivers, the Punjab and its envi- rons, constantly assumes the form of an onslaught upon the walled cities of … - Mortimer Wheeler

" "

The Aryan invasion of the Land of Seven Rivers, the Punjab and its envi- rons, constantly assumes the form of an onslaught upon the walled cities of the aborigines. For these cities the term used in the ¸igveda is pur, mean- ing a “rampart,” “fort” or “stronghold.” . . . Indra, the Aryan War god, is puraydara, “fort-destroyer.” He shatters “ninety forts” for his Aryan protégé Divodasa. [. . .] Where are – or were – these citadels? It has in the past been supposed that they were mythical, or were “merely places of refuge against attack, ramparts of hardened earth with palisades and a ditch.” The recent exca- vation of Harappa may be thought to have changed the picture. Here we have a highly evolved civilization of essentially non-Aryan type, now known to have employed massive fortifications, and known also to have dominated the river-system of north-western India at a time not distant from the likely period of the earlier Aryan invasions of that region. What destroyed this firmly settled civilization? Climatic, economic, political deterioration may have weakened it, but its ultimate extinction is more likely to have been completed by deliberate and large-scale destruction. It may be no mere chance that at a late period of Mohenjo-daro men, women and children appear to have been massacred there. On circumstantial evidence, Indra stands accused.