DDK HistoryF.p65 - CSIR

74 EVIDENCE FOR INVASIONS [3.4
There is nothing to prove that exactly the same invaders penetrated or
occupied Mohenjo-daro or Chanhu-daro, though corpses of the inhabitants
lying in the streets or rooms or stairs of the former city, and evidence of
barbarous foreigners occupying part of the latter town at its end-phase
prove at lea^t similar invasion or raiding in each case. It is clear from
the excavations that these newcomers brought no writing of their
own, added no substantial construction to the city (unless it has
disappeared entirely from brick-robbing at Harappa), and that the
cities vanished soon after their arrival, in spite of a millennial past.
This would be inexplicable unless the basis of food-production had also
been ruined at the same time. The invaders did not or could not continue
the older type of agriculture, whatever it was, nor had they any better
method of their own. Here the Indus valtey differs from Mesopotamia,
which sprouted new cities witnout ruining the old, supported invader
after invader, some of whom (like the dynasty of Hammurabi) left a
profound mark both upon the older Mesopotamian cities and upon the
history of world civilization. The end of those cities (like Ur) can be
correlated with considerable certainty with the neglect of the system
of irrigation canals, say in the later Assyrian and Persian periods.
Vedic Indra is described again and again as freeing the streams.
This was taken as a nature-myth in the days of Max Miiller, a poetic
representation of the rain-god’ letting pent-up waters loose from
imprisoning clouds. Recorded but ignored details of the feat make such
an explanation quite impossible. Indra freed the rivers from the grip
of a demon Vrtra. The word has been analysed by two most
competent philologists ie [with full knowledge of Iranian (Arran) as well
as Sanskrit records] who did not trouble to theorise about the means
of production: Their conclusion from purely philological considerations
was that vrtra meant “obstacle,” “barrage,” or “bloquage,” not a
demon. The actual Rgvedic description independently bears this out
in full. The demon lay like a dark snake across the slopes. The rivers
were brought to a stand still (tastabhanah) ; when the “demon” was
struck by Indra’s shattering weapon (vajra)’, the ground buckled,
the stones rolled away like chariot wheels, the pent-up waters flowed
over the demon’s recumbent body (cf. RV. 4.19.4-8; 2.15.3).