Revisiting Settlement Contemporaneity and Exploring Stability and Instability: Case Studies from the Indus Civilization.

"Map overestimation," or "the contemporaneity problem," derives from the assumption that settlements identified during surface surveys were occupied throughout individual periods. Inductive and simulation analysis have been used to ascertain the degree of contemporaneity in surface survey data sets, as variation in settlement location is critical for understanding population density and demography, which inform social, economic and political interpretations. This paper revisits the inductive approach to interrogating survey data developed by W. M. Sumner and the simulation model approach developed by R. E. Dewar to explore the survey data from two regions within South Asia's Indus civilization. This analysis demonstrates the strengths and weaknesses of these approaches. It also highlights the variability in settlement systems in different areas within the Indus civilization and shows that consideration of stability and instability within settlement systems is an important factor when considering dynamics of resilience and sustainability.ER

Abrupt weakening of the summer monsoon in northwest India ~4100 yr ago

Climate change has been suggested as a possible cause for the decline of urban centers of the Indus Civilization ∼4000 yr ago, but extant paleoclimatic evidence has been derived from locations well outside the distribution of Indus settlements. Here we report an oxygen isotope record of gastropod aragonite (δ18Oa) from Holocene sediments of paleolake Kotla Dahar (Haryana, India), which is adjacent to Indus settlements and documents Indian summer monsoon (ISM) variability for the past 6.5 k.y. A 4‰ increase in δ18Oa occurred at ca. 4.1 ka marking a peak in the evaporation/precipitation ratio in the lake catchment related to weakening of the ISM. Although dating uncertainty exists in both climate and archaeological records, the drought event 4.1 ka on the northwestern Indian plains is within the radiocarbon age range for the beginning of Indus de-urbanization, suggesting that climate may have played a role in the Indus cultural transformation

Abrupt weakening of the Indian summer monsoon at 8.2 kyr B.P.

An oxygen isotope record of biogenic carbonate from paleolake Riwasa in northwestern (NW) India provides a history of the Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM) from ∼11 to 6 kyr B.P. The lake was dry throughout the Late Glacial period when aeolian sands were deposited. Lacustrine sedimentation commenced in the early Holocene and the lake deepened significantly at ∼9.4 kyr B.P., indicating a strengthening of the ISM in response to summer insolation forcing. This high lake stand was interrupted by an abrupt desiccation, which is marked by a 12-cm limestone hardground that formed during a period of sub-aerial exposure after ∼8.3 kyr B.P. The base of the hardground surface coincides with the beginning of the ‘8.2-kyr B.P. cooling event’ in the North Atlantic that has been associated with a glacial outburst flood and slowdown of Atlantic meridional overturning circulation. The hardground provides robust evidence of a weakening of the ISM on the Indian subcontinent at ∼8.2 kyr B.P., and supports previous results of a strong teleconnection between monsoon Asia and North Atlantic climate. Lacustrine sedimentation resumed at ∼7.9 kyr B.P. suggesting the 8.2-kyr desiccation of paleolake Riwasa represented an abrupt response of the ISM to forcing from the North Atlantic

'We are inheritors of a rural civilisation': rural complexity and the ceramic economy in the Indus Civilisation in northwest India.

What role do villages play in 'an urban civilisation'? Although it is likely that most of the populations of South Asia's ancient Indus Civilisation would not have lived in cities, it is not clear what their rural way of life would have encompassed. Using ceramic assemblages excavated from Indus-period villages in northwest India, alongside ethnographic records on village organization and rural craft production, this paper argues that Indus villages were characterized by rural complexity. This comprised a range of activities, including craft production, as well as short- and long-distance socio-economic links. Drawing on historical narratives, we show how South Asian villages have been essentialized and presented as either ideal or conservative extremes. We argue for the importance of a better understanding of the breadth and nuances of the rural sphere, and for a greater research focus on village life in the Indus context.The Land, Water and Settlement project was primarily funded by a Standard Award from the UK India Education and Research Initiative (UKIERI) under the title “From the Collapse of Harappan Urbanism to the Rise of the Great Early Historic Cities: Investigating the Cultural and Geographical Transformation of Northwest India between 2000 and 300 BC.” Smaller grants were also awarded by the British Academy’s Stein Arnold Fund, the Isaac Newton Trust, the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, and the Natural Environment Research Council. The fieldwork and research carried out by Danika Parikh was funded by the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust, the Sadacc Trust, the Sir Richard Stapley Educational Trust, and Newnham and Pembroke Colleges, Cambridge

Multi-scale relief model (MSRM): a new algorithm for the visualization of subtle topographic change of variable size in digital elevation models.

Morphological analysis of landforms has traditionally relied on the interpretation of imagery. Although imagery provides a natural view of an area of interest (AOI) images are largely hindered by the environmental conditions at the time of image acquisition, the quality of the image and, mainly, the lack of topographical information, which is an essential factor for a correct understanding of the AOI's geomorphology. More recently digital surface models (DSMs) have been incorporated into the analytical toolbox of geomorphologists. These are usually high-resolution models derived from digital photogrammetric processes or LiDAR data. However, these are restricted to relatively small areas and are expensive or complex to acquire, which limits widespread implementation. In this paper, we present the multi-scale relief model (MSRM), which is a new algorithm for the visual interpretation of landforms using DSMs. The significance of this new method lies in its capacity to extract landform morphology from both high- and low-resolution DSMs independently of the shape or scale of the landform under study. This method thus provides important advantages compared to previous approaches as it: (1) allows the use of worldwide medium resolution models, such as SRTM, ASTER GDEM, ALOS, and TanDEM-X; (2) offers an alternative to traditional photograph interpretation that does not rely on the quality of the imagery employed nor on the environmental conditions and time of its acquisition; and (3) can be easily implemented for large areas using traditional GIS/RS software. The algorithm is tested in the Sutlej-Yamuna interfluve, which is a very large low-relief alluvial plain in northwest India where 10 000 km of palaeoriver channels have been mapped using MSRM. The code, written in Google Earth Engine's implementation of JavaScript, is provided as Supporting Information for its use in any other AOI without particular technical knowledge or access to topographical data. © 2017 The Authors. Earth Surface Processes and Landforms published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd

Automated detection of archaeological mounds using machine-learning classification of multisensor and multitemporal satellite data.

This paper presents an innovative multisensor, multitemporal machine-learning approach using remote sensing big data for the detection of archaeological mounds in Cholistan (Pakistan). The Cholistan Desert presents one of the largest concentrations of Indus Civilization sites (from ca 3300 to 1500 BC). Cholistan has figured prominently in theories about changes in water availability, the rise and decline of the Indus Civilization, and the transformation of fertile monsoonal alluvial plains into an extremely arid margin. This paper implements a multisensor, multitemporal machine-learning approach for the remote detection of archaeological mounds. A classifier algorithm that employs a large-scale collection of synthetic-aperture radar and multispectral images has been implemented in Google Earth Engine, resulting in an accurate probability map for mound-like signatures across an area that covers ca 36,000 km2 The results show that the area presents many more archaeological mounds than previously recorded, extending south and east into the desert, which has major implications for understanding the archaeological significance of the region. The detection of small (30 ha) suggests that there were continuous shifts in settlement location. These shifts are likely to reflect responses to a dynamic and changing hydrological network and the influence of the progressive northward advance of the desert in a long-term process that culminated in the abandonment of much of the settled area during the Late Harappan period.ER

Indian winter and summer monsoon strength over the 4.2 ka BP event in foraminifer isotope records from the Indus River delta in the Arabian Sea

The plains of northwest South Asia receive rainfall during both the Indian summer (June–September) and winter (December–March) monsoon. Researchers have long attempted to deconstruct the influence of these precipitation regimes in paleoclimate records, in order to better understand regional climatic drivers and their potential impact on human populations. The mid–late Holocene transition between 5.3 and 3.3 ka is of particular interest in this region because it spans the period of the Indus Civilization from its early development, through its urbanization, and onto eventual transformation into a rural society. An oxygen isotope record of the surface-dwelling planktonic foraminifer Globigerinoides ruber from the northeast Arabian Sea provided evidence for an abrupt decrease in rainfall and reduction in Indus River discharge at 4.2 ka, which the authors linked to the decline in the urban phase of the Indus Civilization (Staubwasser et al., 2003). Given the importance of this study, we used the same core (63KA) to measure the oxygen isotope profiles of two other foraminifer species at decadal resolution over the interval from 5.4 to 3.0 ka and to replicate a larger size fraction of G. ruber than measured previously. By selecting both thermocline-dwelling (Neogloboquadrina dutertrei) and shallow-dwelling (Globigerinoides sacculifer) species, we provide enhanced detail of the climatic changes that occurred over this crucial time interval. We found evidence for a period of increased surface water mixing, which we suggest was related to a strengthened winter monsoon with a peak intensity over 200 years from 4.5 to 4.3 ka. The time of greatest change occurred at 4.1 ka when both the summer and winter monsoon weakened, resulting in a reduction in rainfall in the Indus region. The earliest phase of the urban Mature Harappan period coincided with the period of inferred stronger winter monsoon between 4.5 and 4.3 ka, whereas the end of the urbanized phase occurred some time after the decrease in both the summer and winter monsoon strength by 4.1 ka. Our findings provide evidence that the initial growth of large Indus urban centers coincided with increased winter rainfall, whereas the contraction of urbanism and change in subsistence strategies followed a reduction in rainfall of both seasons

Seeking sustainable pathways for fostering agricultural transformation in peninsular India

Abstract: Sizable populations in developing countries in Asia and Africa live in dryland ecosystems, and agriculture in these areas faces major challenges including water scarcity, land degradation, poor infrastructure and insufficient access to markets. Natural resource management (NRM) interventions offer an important path to sustainable agricultural practices through increasing resource use efficiency, but true efficacy will only be achievable if these initiatives can be scaled up. This paper explores the impact of farm-scale NRM interventions undertaken in the state of Karnataka, India, between 2005 and 2020. NRM technologies such as soil health management, resource use efficiency and improved crop cultivars were demonstrated in more than 50 000 farmers’ fields. Participatory demonstrations and capacity building initiatives were effectively used to co-create innovations for rapid and wide dissemination, and NRM practices involving the soil-nutrient-crop-water continuum were the subject of large-scale demonstrations. The demonstration fields were divided into treated and control fields, and efforts were made to measure cost of cultivation, irrigation application and crop yield. The soil health management interventions helped to enhance crop yield by 10%–60% over the control plots. Technologies specific to resource conservation have helped to conserve soil moisture, reduce irrigation requirement by 50–300 mm and reduce the cost of cultivation by US$ 150 ha−1. Improved cereal, pulse and oil seed cultivars increased crop yield minimum by 15%. Although these results have a large variability, they consistently showed the effectiveness of integrating NRM practices with crop demonstrations. These results are ideal for sensitizing stakeholders and policymakers to the benefits of adopting science-based approaches to NRM interventions in order to bridge yield gaps and address land degradation, food insecurity and poverty in dryland regions in South Asia and globally

Seeking sustainable pathways for fostering agricultural transformation in peninsular India

Abstract: Sizable populations in developing countries in Asia and Africa live in dryland ecosystems, and agriculture in these areas faces major challenges including water scarcity, land degradation, poor infrastructure and insufficient access to markets. Natural resource management (NRM) interventions offer an important path to sustainable agricultural practices through increasing resource use efficiency, but true efficacy will only be achievable if these initiatives can be scaled up. This paper explores the impact of farm-scale NRM interventions undertaken in the state of Karnataka, India, between 2005 and 2020. NRM technologies such as soil health management, resource use efficiency and improved crop cultivars were demonstrated in more than 50 000 farmers’ fields. Participatory demonstrations and capacity building initiatives were effectively used to co-create innovations for rapid and wide dissemination, and NRM practices involving the soil-nutrient-crop-water continuum were the subject of large-scale demonstrations. The demonstration fields were divided into treated and control fields, and efforts were made to measure cost of cultivation, irrigation application and crop yield. The soil health management interventions helped to enhance crop yield by 10%–60% over the control plots. Technologies specific to resource conservation have helped to conserve soil moisture, reduce irrigation requirement by 50–300 mm and reduce the cost of cultivation by US$ 150 ha−1. Improved cereal, pulse and oil seed cultivars increased crop yield minimum by 15%. Although these results have a large variability, they consistently showed the effectiveness of integrating NRM practices with crop demonstrations. These results are ideal for sensitizing stakeholders and policymakers to the benefits of adopting science-based approaches to NRM interventions in order to bridge yield gaps and address land degradation, food insecurity and poverty in dryland regions in South Asia and globally

Adaptation to Variable Environments, Resilience to Climate Change: Investigating Land, Water and Settlement in Indus Northwest India

This paper explores the nature and dynamics of adaptation and resilience in the face of a diverse and varied environmental and ecological context using the case study of South Asia’s Indus Civilization (ca. 3000–1300 BC). Most early complex societies developed in regions where the climatic parameters faced by ancient subsistence farmers were varied but rain falls primarily in one season. In contrast, the Indus Civilization developed in a specific environmental context that spanned a very distinct environmental threshold, where winter and summer rainfall systems overlap. There is now evidence to show that this region was directly subject to climate change during the period when the Indus Civilization was at its height (ca. 2500–1900 BC). The Indus Civilization, therefore, provides a unique opportunity to understand how an ancient society coped with diverse and varied ecologies and change in the fundamental environmental parameters. This paper integrates research carried out as part of the Land, Water and Settlement project in northwest India between 2007 and 2014. Although coming from only one of the regions occupied by Indus populations, these data necessitate the reconsideration of several prevailing views about the Indus Civilization as a whole and invigorate discussion about human-environment interactions and their relationship to processes of cultural transformation