Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- Message
- Message
- Preface
- CHAPTER 1 The Dancing Girl
- CHAPTER 2 The Vedic Age
- CHAPTER 3 The Middle Path
- CHAPTER 4 Greeks at the Door
- CHAPTER 5 The Science of Government
- CHAPTER 6 Remorse at Kalinga
- CHAPTER 7 Martyrdom at Mylapore
- CHAPTER 8 Valley of Blood
- CHAPTER 9 The Nine Gems
- CHAPTER 10 The Giver of Knowledge
- CHAPTER 11 Arab Storm
- CHAPTER 12 The Reformation
- CHAPTER 13 The Gates of Somnath
- CHAPTER 14 Beacon of Civilization
- CHAPTER 15 Sovereign Lord
- CHAPTER 16 A Slave's Slave
- CHAPTER 17 The Shadow of Allah
- CHAPTER 18 Thousand Dinar Kafur
- CHAPTER 19 Delhi Woes
- CHAPTER 20 The Bulwark
- CHAPTER 21 For Christians and Spices
- CHAPTER 22 Matchlocks and Cannons
- CHAPTER 23 The Afghan
- CHAPTER 24 The Last Maharajah of Delhi
- CHAPTER 25 The Death of a City
- CHAPTER 26 The Divine Religion
- CHAPTER 27 The Book
- CHAPTER 28 The Light of the World
- CHAPTER 29 Splendour Amidst Misery
- CHAPTER 30 The Seizer of the Universe
- Select Bibliography
- Further Reading
- Photo Credits
- Index
- About the Author
CHAPTER 1 - The Dancing Girl
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 October 2015
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Foreword
- Message
- Message
- Preface
- CHAPTER 1 The Dancing Girl
- CHAPTER 2 The Vedic Age
- CHAPTER 3 The Middle Path
- CHAPTER 4 Greeks at the Door
- CHAPTER 5 The Science of Government
- CHAPTER 6 Remorse at Kalinga
- CHAPTER 7 Martyrdom at Mylapore
- CHAPTER 8 Valley of Blood
- CHAPTER 9 The Nine Gems
- CHAPTER 10 The Giver of Knowledge
- CHAPTER 11 Arab Storm
- CHAPTER 12 The Reformation
- CHAPTER 13 The Gates of Somnath
- CHAPTER 14 Beacon of Civilization
- CHAPTER 15 Sovereign Lord
- CHAPTER 16 A Slave's Slave
- CHAPTER 17 The Shadow of Allah
- CHAPTER 18 Thousand Dinar Kafur
- CHAPTER 19 Delhi Woes
- CHAPTER 20 The Bulwark
- CHAPTER 21 For Christians and Spices
- CHAPTER 22 Matchlocks and Cannons
- CHAPTER 23 The Afghan
- CHAPTER 24 The Last Maharajah of Delhi
- CHAPTER 25 The Death of a City
- CHAPTER 26 The Divine Religion
- CHAPTER 27 The Book
- CHAPTER 28 The Light of the World
- CHAPTER 29 Splendour Amidst Misery
- CHAPTER 30 The Seizer of the Universe
- Select Bibliography
- Further Reading
- Photo Credits
- Index
- About the Author
Summary
In the very first gallery on the ground floor of the National Museum in New Delhi, a small bronze statuette of a naked girl in what appears to be a dancing pose is displayed in a glass showcase. It was cast around 2500 BCE. Over thousands of years, humans living in the Stone Age made improvements to their stone implements and weapons. They may have discovered copper, silver, tin or gold but these metals in their pure state are soft and could not replace stone tools. The mixing of tin and copper to create the alloy, bronze, which is stronger than its individual components and stronger than stone, was the technological breakthrough that distinguished the Bronze Age. Bronze created new possibilities for human society and lifted civilization a notch upwards.
The statuette indicates that a Bronze Age Civilization existed in India 4,500 years ago, possibly the most advanced human civilization in the world of that ancient time. This is a forgotten period of Indian history which was only recently discovered. India in its subsequent history would have periods of achievement but it would not have the distinction of being the most advanced society in the world again.
The remains of the earliest Homo sapiens in South Asia were found in Sri Lanka and they date back to 34,000 years ago. While peninsular India has yielded numerous stone artefacts from the Old Stone Age (Palaeolithic Period), no such artefacts have been found in the Indo-Gangetic Valley possibly because this area was an uninhabitable marshland in those early days. As marshland became fertile riverine valleys, Homo sapiens descended from the Deccan to the Indo-Gangetic Valley. The life of the Palaeolithic Man was barely distinguishable from that of other animals. They lived as packs of hunter food-gatherers. With improvement in their ability to fashion stone, new tools like sharp stone arrowheads and knives were created, heralding the Middle Stone Age (Mesolithic Period).
Around 8000 BCE, in several regions around the world, as the Ice Age receded, human society entered the New Stone Age (Neolithic Period). The hallmark of the Neolithic Man was the domestication of plants. The advent of agriculture marks the origin of civilization.
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- Information
- The Dancing GirlA History of Early India, pp. 1 - 11Publisher: ISEAS–Yusof Ishak InstitutePrint publication year: 2011