| Prehistory
Mehrgarh, (7000-5500 BCE), on the Kachi plain of Balochistan, is an important Neolithic site discovered in 1974, with early evidence of farming and herding,[18] and dentistry.[19] Early residents lived in mud brick houses, stored grain in granaries, fashioned tools with copper ore, cultivated barley, wheat, jujubes and dates, and herded sheep, goats and cattle, while later residents (5500-2600 BCE) engaged in crafts, including flint knapping, tanning, bead production, and metalworking. The site was occupied continuously until about 2600 BCE,[20] but climatic changes between 2600 and 2000 BCE caused the area to become more arid. Mehrgarh was abandoned in favour of the Indus valley,[21] where a new civilization was in the early stages of development.[22]
The Indus Valley civilization developed between 3300-1700 BCE on the banks of the Indus River and at its peak had as many as five million inhabitants in hundreds of settlements extending as far as the Arabian Sea, southeastern Iran and the Himalayas.[23] The major urban centers were at Dholavira, Harappa, Lothal, Mohenjo-daro, and Rakhigarhi, as well as an offshoot called the Kulli culture (2500-2000 BCE) in southern Balochistan, which had similar settlements, pottery and other artifacts. The Indus Valley civilisation has been tentatively identified as proto-Dravidian, but this cannot be confirmed until the Indus script is fully deciphered.[24] The civilization collapsed abruptly around 1700 BCE, possibly due to a cataclysmic earthquake or the drying up of the Ghaggar-Hakra river.
In the early part of the second millennium BCE, Indo-European tribes from Central Asia or the southern Russian steppes migrated into the region,[25] and settled in the Sapta Sindhu area between the Kabul River and the Upper Ganges-Yamuna rivers.[26] The resulting Vedic culture lasted until the middle of the first millennium BCE when there were marked linguistic, cultural and political changes.[27] During the Vedic culture, the hymns of the Rigveda were composed and the foundations of Hinduism were laid. The city of Taxila, in present-day northern Pakistan, became important in Hinduism (and later in Buddhism) — traditionally the Mahābhārata epic was first recited at Taxila at the snake sacrifice of King Janamejaya, one of the heroes of the story.[28]
The Indus plains formed the most populous and richest satrapy of the Persian Achaemenid Empire for almost two centuries from the reign of Darius the Great (522-485 BCE).[29] The Achaemenids used the Aramaic script for the Persian language, but other scripts became more popular after the end of Achaemenid rule, such as Kharoṣṭhī (derived from Aramaic) and Greek. The interaction between Hellenistic Greece and Buddhism began when Alexander the Great overthrew the Achaemenid empire in 334 BCE, and marched eastwards. Eventually, after defeating King Porus at the Battle of the Hydaspes (near modern Jhelum), he conquered much of the Punjab region, but his battle weary troops refused to advance any further into India[30] to engage the mighty army of Nanda Dynasty so Alexander travelled southwest along the Indus valley.[31] Along the way he engaged in several battles and founded several new Macedonian/Greek settlements in ****hara and Punjab, before marching his army westward across the Makran desert towards modern Iran. |