Bara Culture was a culture that emerged in the eastern region of the
Indus Valley civilization
The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation was a Bronze Age civilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900&n ...
around 2000 BCE.
It developed in the
doab
''Doab'' () is a term used in South Asia Quote: "Originally and chiefly in South Asia: (the name of) a strip or narrow tract of land between two rivers; spec. (with) the area between the rivers Ganges and Jumna in northern India." for the tract ...
between the
Yamuna
The Yamuna (Hindustani language, Hindustani: ), also spelt Jumna, is the second-largest tributary river of the Ganges by discharge and the longest tributary in List of major rivers of India, India. Originating from the Yamunotri Glacier at a ...
and
Sutlej
The Sutlej or Satluj River () is the longest of the five rivers that flow through the historic crossroads region of Punjab in northern India and Pakistan. The Sutlej River is also known as ''Satadru''. It is the easternmost tributary of the Ind ...
rivers, hemmed on its eastern periphery by the
Shivalik ranges Shivalik may refer to:
* Siwalik Hills, a series of ranges of outer foothills of Himalaya crossing Pakistan, India, Nepal, and Bhutan
* ''Shivalik'' class frigate, a class of multi-role stealth frigates in service with the Indian Navy
** INS ''Sh ...
of the lower Himalayas. This territory corresponds to modern-day
Punjab
Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising ...
,
Haryana
Haryana (; ) is an Indian state located in the northern part of the country. It was carved out of the former state of East Punjab on 1 Nov 1966 on a linguistic basis. It is ranked 21st in terms of area, with less than 1.4% () of India's land ar ...
and
Western Uttar Pradesh
Western Uttar Pradesh is a region in India that comprises the western districts of Uttar Pradesh state, including the areas of Rohilkhand and those where Khariboli, Braj and Kannauji are spoken. The region has some demographic, economic and cul ...
in
North India
North India is a loosely defined region consisting of the northern part of India. The dominant geographical features of North India are the Indo-Gangetic Plain and the Himalayas, which demarcate the region from the Tibetan Plateau and Central ...
.
Older publications regard the Baran pottery to have initially developed independently of the Harappan culture branch of the Indus Valley Civilization from a pre-Harappan tradition, although the two cultures later intermingled in locations such as
Kotla Nihang Khan
Kotla Nihang Khan is a town located about 3 kilometers southeast of Ropar city in Punjab, India. It is famed as the erstwhile principality of the seventeenth-century Pathan ''zamindar'' ruler, Nihang Khan, who was an associate of the tenth Sikh G ...
and
Bara, Punjab.
According to Akinori Uesugi and Vivek Dangi, Bara pottery is a stilistic development of Late Harappan pottery.
In the conventional timeline demarcations of the
Indus Valley Tradition
The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation was a Bronze Age civilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900&n ...
, the Bara culture is usually placed in the Late Harappan period.
Bara culture is so-named because initial evidence for its existence was discovered from archeological digs at the site in
Bara, Punjab.
Dher Majra and
Sanghol
Sanghol is a historical village located in Fatehgarh Sahib District of Punjab, India predating to Harrapan civilisation. It is also known as Uchha Pind Sanghol. It is about 40 km from Chandigarh on the way to Ludhiana and approximately 10& ...
are other important Bara culture sites that have been excavated.
Baran pottery
Bara culture: Based on the
pottery
Pottery is the process and the products of forming vessels and other objects with clay and other ceramic materials, which are fired at high temperatures to give them a hard and durable form. Major types include earthenware, stoneware and por ...
found here, it is classified as a separate archaeological culture / subculture.
[The Harappan Civilisation: Its Sub-cultures]
Daily Pioneer, 10 May 2018.
Older publications regard the Baran culture to have initially developed independently of the Harappan culture branch of the Indus Valley Civilization from a pre-Harappan tradition, although the two cultures later intermingled in locations such as
Kotla Nihang Khan
Kotla Nihang Khan is a town located about 3 kilometers southeast of Ropar city in Punjab, India. It is famed as the erstwhile principality of the seventeenth-century Pathan ''zamindar'' ruler, Nihang Khan, who was an associate of the tenth Sikh G ...
and
Bara, Punjab.
Pottery remnants of the Bara culture reveal a style that is consistently differentiable from that of the Harappan culture, though there are some shared features as well. Specific forms quintessentially associated with the Harappans, such as "perforated jar, S shaped jar, tall dish-on-stand with drum, goblet, beaker and handled-cup" are absent.
Instead, other forms unique to the Barans are found, including jars and vessels "incised on shoulder and rusticated at the bottom", jars with bulbous bodies, long necks and flaring rims, and collared-rim jars.
Harappan dishes-on-stand (i.e. dishes with a stand beneath) have long and slender necks, whereas Baran dishes-on-stand have short and thick ones. Harappan wares tend to be plain, while Baran ware is usually embellished with painted patterns (such as brush-made spirals) and decorative incisions, often on the interior side of vessels and jars.
According to Akinori Uesugi and Vivek Dangi, Bara pottery is a stilistic development of Late Harappan pottery.
[Akinori Uesugi and Vivek Dangi (2017)]
''A Study on the Developments of the Bara Pottery in the Ghaggar Plains''
In K. Hetu (ed.), ''Essays in Prehistory, Protohistory and Historical Archaeology, Festschrift to Shri. K. N. Dikshit'': 176–197. New Delhi New Bharatiya Book Corporation.
Possible role in propagating citrus cultivation
Lemon
The lemon (''Citrus limon'') is a species of small evergreen trees in the flowering plant family Rutaceae, native to Asia, primarily Northeast India (Assam), Northern Myanmar or China.
The tree's ellipsoidal yellow fruit is used for culin ...
seeds were found at the excavations at the Baran settlement at Sanghol, which remains the only evidence for
citrus
''Citrus'' is a genus of flowering plant, flowering trees and shrubs in the rue family, Rutaceae. Plants in the genus produce citrus fruits, including important crops such as Orange (fruit), oranges, Lemon, lemons, grapefruits, pomelos, and lim ...
cultivation this far west at that time. Citrus is thought to have been domesticated first in a region centered on
Northeastern India
, native_name_lang = mni
, settlement_type =
, image_skyline =
, image_alt =
, image_caption =
, motto =
, image_map = Northeast india.png
, ...
, South China and the northern regions of
Southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...
, and diffused outwards from there. The finding at Sanghol suggests that westward diffusion may have occurred along the Ganges Valley where the Barans may have gained knowledge of citrus cultivation in the early second millennium BCE period and then contributed to westwards propagation. Citrus cultivation is believed to have arrived in
Southwest Asia
Western Asia, West Asia, or Southwest Asia, is the westernmost subregion of the larger geographical region of Asia, as defined by some academics, UN bodies and other institutions. It is almost entirely a part of the Middle East, and includes Anat ...
in the 1200 BCE period and lemons more specifically in the first millennium CE.
Urbanization
Bara culture, at several sites demonstrates urban features. For instance excavation at
Sanghol
Sanghol is a historical village located in Fatehgarh Sahib District of Punjab, India predating to Harrapan civilisation. It is also known as Uchha Pind Sanghol. It is about 40 km from Chandigarh on the way to Ludhiana and approximately 10& ...
and
Rupar
Rupnagar (; formerly known as Ropar is a city and a municipal council in Rupnagar district in the Indian state of Punjab. Rupnagar is a newly created fifth Divisional Headquarters of Punjab comprising Rupnagar, Mohali, and its adjoining dist ...
yielded an urban city set up. Other sites such as Deeg (
Kaithal
Kaithal () is a city and municipal council in the Kaithal district of the Indian state of Haryana. Kaithal was previously a part of Karnal district and later, Kurukshetra district until 1 November 1989, when it became the headquarters of the K ...
) and Hudia (
Yamunanagar
Yamunanagar (), is a city and a municipal corporation in Yamunanagar district in the Indian state of Haryana. This town is known for the cluster of plywood units and paper industries. It provides timber to larger industries. The older town is ...
) also demonstrated characteristic town or urban features.
[https://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/200233/18/18_chapter%208.pdf ]
See also
*
Indus Valley civilization
The Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC), also known as the Indus Civilisation was a Bronze Age civilisation in the northwestern regions of South Asia, lasting from 3300 BCE to 1300 BCE, and in its mature form 2600 BCE to 1900&n ...
*
List of Indus Valley Civilization sites
Over 1400 Indus Valley civilisation sites have been discovered, of which 925 sites are in India and 475 sites in Pakistan, while some sites in Afghanistan are believed to be trading colonies. Only 40 sites on the Indus valley were discovere ...
**
Bhirrana
Bhirrana, also Bhirdana and Birhana, (Hindi: भिरड़ाना; IAST: Bhirḍāna) is an archaeological site, located in a small village in Fatehabad District, in the Indian state of Haryana. Bhirrana's earliest archaeological layers pred ...
, 4 phases of IVC with earliest dated to 8th-7th millennium BCE
**
Kalibanga
Kalibangān is a town located at on the left or southern banks of the Ghaggar (Ghaggar-Hakra River) in Tehsil Pilibangān, between Suratgarh and Hanumangarh in Hanumangarh District, Rajasthan, India 205 km. from Bikaner. It is also identifi ...
, an IVC town and fort with several phases starting from Early harappan phase
**
Rakhigarhi
Rakhigarhi or Rakhi Garhi is a village and an archaeological site belonging to the Indus Valley civilisation in Hisar District of the northern Indian state of Haryana, situated about 150 km northwest of Delhi. It was part of the mature pha ...
, one of the largest IVC city with 4 phases of IVC with earliest dated to 8th-7th millennium BCE
**
Kunal
Kunala ( IAST: ) (263 BC – ?) was a son of Emperor Ashoka and Queen Padmavati and the presumptive heir to Ashoka, thus the heir to the Mauryan Empire which once ruled almost all of the Indian subcontinent. After the departure of Mahendra, ...
, cultural ancestor of
Rehman Dheri
Rehman Dheri or sometime Rahman Dheri () is a Indus Valley Civilization, Pre-Harappan Archaeological Site situated near Dera Ismail Khan in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. This is one of the oldest urbanised centres found to date in S ...
**
Kotla Nihang Khan
Kotla Nihang Khan is a town located about 3 kilometers southeast of Ropar city in Punjab, India. It is famed as the erstwhile principality of the seventeenth-century Pathan ''zamindar'' ruler, Nihang Khan, who was an associate of the tenth Sikh G ...
*
**
Hydraulic engineering of the Indus Valley Civilization
The ancient Indus Valley Civilization in South Asia, including current day's Pakistan and north India, was prominent in infrastructure, hydraulic engineering, and had many water supply and sanitation devices that are the first known examples ...
**
Sanitation of the Indus Valley Civilisation
The ancient Indus Valley Civilization in South Asia, including current day's Pakistan and north India, was prominent in infrastructure, hydraulic engineering, and had many water supply and sanitation devices that are the first known examples o ...
**
Periodisation of the Indus Valley Civilisation
Several periodisations are employed for the periodisation of the Indus Valley Civilisation. While the Indus Valley Civilisation was divided into Early, Mature, and Late Harappan by archaeologists like Mortimer Wheeler, newer periodisations incl ...
*
Pottery in the Indian subcontinent
Pottery in the Indian subcontinent has an ancient history and is one of the most tangible and iconic elements of Indian art. Evidence of pottery has been found in the early settlements of Lahuradewa and later the Indus Valley Civilisation. Tod ...
** Bara culture, subtype of Late-Harappan Phase
**
Black and red ware
Black and red ware (BRW) is a South Asian earthenware, associated with the neolithic phase, Harappa, Bronze Age India, Iron Age India, the megalithic and the early historical period. Although it is sometimes called an archaeological culture, the ...
, belonging to neolithic and Early-Harappan phases
**
Sothi-Siswal culture, subtype of Early-Harappan Phase
**
Cemetery H culture
The Cemetery H culture was a Bronze Age culture in the Punjab region in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, from about 1900 BC until about 1300 BC. It is regarded as a regional form of the late phase of the Harappan (Indus Valley ...
(2000-1400 BC), early Indo-Aryan pottery at IVC sites later evolved into
Painted Grey Ware culture
The Painted Grey Ware culture (PGW) is an Iron Age Indian culture of the western Gangetic plain and the Ghaggar-Hakra valley in the Indian subcontinent, conventionally dated 1200 to 600–500 BCE, or from 1300 to 500–300 BCE It is a successo ...
of
Vedic period
The Vedic period, or the Vedic age (), is the period in the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age of the history of India when the Vedic literature, including the Vedas (ca. 1300–900 BCE), was composed in the northern Indian subcontinent, betw ...
*
Rakhigarhi Indus Valley Civilisation Museum
References
{{reflist, 2
External links
ASI Museum - Rupnagar
Archaeological cultures in India
Archaeological cultures of South Asia
Bronze Age cultures of Asia
History of Punjab