Into The Jaws Of The Lion (The Arkana Archaeology Mystery Series Book 5)

by N. S. Wikarski

  “Cass, are you alright?” Erik was shaking her arm. His face looked tense.

  “Sure, why?” she murmured.

  “We seem to have lost you.” Griffin’s expression appeared as troubled as Erik’s. “You were staring vacantly into space. We called but you didn’t hear us.”

  “Well, that’s new,” the Pythia murmured in embarrassment. “I must have drifted off when I touched this.” She glanced ruefully at the wall against which she was leaning.

  “So you got a hit about this building? Something to do with the lily symbol?” The Paladin touched the bricks skeptically.

  “No, it wasn’t like one of my usual trances. This wasn’t about any specific item or place. It was...” Cassie shook her head to clear it. “It was everything.”

  “Everything?” Griffin echoed, uncomprehending.

  “Yeah, everything,” she asserted. “Everything and everybody that was here back in the day.” Straightening, she stepped forward a few paces to focus on the lower town. “There were thousands of people living here but it wasn’t like any ancient city I can think of. There weren’t any temples or big fancy palaces. No statues of gods or kings. No soldiers with spears or swords keeping everybody else in line. I don’t think they needed that. In fact, I got the impression that they wouldn’t have understood a world like that. That wall down there...” She gestured to a fortification built along the southeast edge of the mound. “It wasn’t for defense. At least not at the time it was built. It was to keep the river from flooding the city during the rainy season. They were peaceful. Farmers mostly. They raised grain and kept livestock, though there were lots of craft people too and they traded their goods everywhere. The Indus was closer to the town back then so they used boats to ship their cargo to other places. And it was like...”

  She paused, trying to grasp the essence of what she’d seen. “I think they shared everything in common. This citadel mound is where they gathered. Kind of like a community center. There was a big warehouse where all the grain was stored.” She whirled about. “There!” She pointed to a half-excavated structure on the west side of the hill that was larger than the rest. “That’s where they collected the harvest from everybody and then divvied it up. Nobody went hungry. And they also held their religious rituals pretty much right where we’re standing.” Cassie stopped speaking when she noticed the reaction of her companions. They were gaping at her in surprise.

  “Uh, guys?” she prompted cautiously.

  Griffin let out a deep breath as if he’d been punched in the stomach. “Forgive my astonishment. Your intuitive power has grown remarkably strong.” He gave Erik a sidelong look. “I think it caught us both unawares.”

  “All the years I’ve been in the field, I never saw a Pythia do that before,” Erik admitted.

  “Do what?” Cassie asked.

  “Channel an entire flipping city just by leaning against a pile of bricks, that’s what.”

  “Oh,” she replied in a small voice.

  “In essence, you’ve just summarized everything I was about to say regarding this civilization.” Griffin seemed crestfallen.

  Not wanting to take the wind out of his sails, Cassie coaxed, “Tell it anyway. I probably forgot something important.”

  “Very well, if you insist.” The Scrivener cleared his throat self-consciously. “At the risk of being redundant, here’s what archaeologists have to say about the IVC. There is little doubt that they were a matristic culture which held women in high regard. Female grave goods tended to be more elaborate than that of males. DNA evidence shows that men were commonly buried with the families of their wives. This would indicate matrilineal and matrilocal customs. In addition, their statuary predominantly depicts female figurines and a divine mother is assumed to have been the principal deity in their pantheon. Trade goods found at this site would indicate that these people had contact with merchants from as far away as Mesopotamia and Crete. Because their entire economy was based on agriculture and trade, they didn’t glorify military conquest. There is no evidence of an authoritarian male ruler or a standing army to enforce his will. What is true at Mohenjo-Daro is equally true of the other IVC sites. The structural uniformity of all their cities proves they were part of a common civilization that shared the same technology, social organization and religious practices.”

  Griffin paused and chuckled unexpectedly. “Of course Cassie discovered all those things about the IVC in a matter of seconds. My dear Pythia, if you continue at this rate you’ll put me out of a job entirely.”

  “But I didn’t get anything specific,” Cassie objected. “It was only an overall impression of what things were like.”

  “That’s more than any archaeologist could get after a year of digging, toots,” Erik countered. “So take your victory lap.”

  “Perhaps we can use your newfound abilities to answer a question that has puzzled observers from the very beginning,” the Scrivener ventured.

  “Ask away but I’m not sure I’ll have the answer,” Cassie demurred.

  Ignoring her uncertainty, Griffin pressed on. “Many of the features of this site have been explained by archaeologists as if Mohenjo-Daro were an overlord city-state obsessed with warfare. Take for example the fortification wall. The conventional rationale is that the wall was built for defense. Your vision shows that it was constructed to prevent flooding.” He turned to point upward at the tower capped by the stupa. “What about this? It’s called a citadel. In a medieval castle, the citadel would have been the last line of defense against an invading army. It would have served a military purpose. Is that what this citadel was used for?”

  “Not hardly.” Cassie snorted in derision. “It was an observation tower.”

  “What?” Erik squinted at her.

  “They used it to watch the stars and track the movement of the planets,” she explained.

  Griffin nodded approvingly. “That makes perfect sense when one considers how technologically-advanced these people were. They developed a precise system of weights and measures. Their streets were laid out in a grid pattern which demonstrates considerable engineering skill. It stands to reason that they would have created an equally sophisticated calendar system. To do so would have required an observatory where they could collect astronomical data.”

  Griffin stopped speaking abruptly and wandered off to the left, leaving his colleagues to stare after him in bafflement.

  “Where’s he going now?” Erik asked.

  Cassie shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”

  Chapter 15—The Pen Is Mightier Than The Truth

  Cassie and Erik followed Griffin until he came to a sudden halt before a large square hole in the ground. The hole was roughly forty feet long, twenty five feet wide and eight feet deep. It looked like a swimming pool with stairs on either end leading down to the bottom.

  Gesturing toward the pool, the Scrivener said, “This structure illustrates my point about the level of sophistication the Indus Valley people possessed.”

  “Because they liked to take baths?” Erik ventured doubtfully.

  “Of course not.” Griffin rolled his eyes. “I’m referring to the way this particular pool is designed. It’s known as the ‘Great Bath’ and was probably used for ritual purposes.” He paused, waiting for Cassie to confirm or deny his theory.

  “You’re right about that,” she concurred. “I get the feeling that it was part of their religion.”

  The Scrivener continued. “The tank is made of waterproof brick. It has its own well to feed the inlet channels which filled the bath and an outlet drain to carry away waste water when the pool needed to be cleaned.”

  “You mean like a sewer pipe?” Cassie’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

  “Yes, clay pipes carried waste water outside the city. And this wasn’t the only structure in Mohenjo-Daro with advanced plumbing. Most of the houses had running water and flush toilets. Clay pipes fed into covered sewer drains that ran down each street. All the waste flowed downstre
am into the river. Considering that the town’s population at its peak was forty thousand people, this sanitation system was a major feat of civic engineering. And it all occurred two thousand years before the Romans built their first aqueduct.”

  “It makes you wonder how they developed all that technology,” Cassie said. “It’s almost as if it came from out of nowhere. One day, everybody is a gatherer-hunter in this part of the world and the next, boom, they’re living in houses with flush toilets. What gives?”

  Griffin smiled knowingly. He sat down on the side of the Great Bath.

  Cassie was about to do the same when Erik grabbed her elbow.

  “Are you sure it’s safe to do that?” he asked.

  “I’m pretty sure that whatever info I was meant to get has been gotten.” She sat down. “See, I’m still here.”

  Erik took a seat beside her

  The two of them transferred their attention back to Griffin.

  “You were saying?” Cassie prompted.

  “Quite right. I was about to reply to your question regarding advances in IVC technology. I believe you’re approaching the problem from the wrong end.”

  “I am?”

  “You’re viewing Mohenjo-Daro as if it represented the beginning of civilization in the Indus River Valley. I rather think it constituted the end of a very long cycle of innovation.”

  Both his listeners treated him to a blank look.

  “Allow me to explain. Mohenjo-Daro peaked between 2600 BCE and 1900 BCE after which desiccation gradually affected the region. The IVC as a whole flourished between 3300 BCE and 1300 BCE. However, it’s quite possible that this civilization stretches even farther back than 3300 BCE.”

  “That’s not a huge surprise,” Cassie said. “Catal Huyuk in Turkey goes back nine thousand years.”

  “As does an IVC town called Mehrgarh which is estimated to be as old as Catal Huyuk ,” Griffin added. “The dwellings follow the same design as the houses we’re looking at here in Mohenjo-Daro. One of the most fascinating finds at Mehrgarh was that its inhabitants practiced proto-dentistry. Several of the skeletons found at the site exhibited drilled molar crowns in their teeth.”

  “Get out!” Cassie exclaimed.

  The Scrivener laughed at her reaction. “Prepare to be further amazed. I have a theory that the residents of Mehrgarh received their knowledge from an even older source. A source that lies at the bottom of the Arabian Sea.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve come across sunken buildings,” Erik interjected. “That temple three miles off the coast of Malta. An entire city submerged in the Gulf of Guinea near Nigeria.”

  “Precisely,” Griffin affirmed. “A city was recently discovered about twelve miles away from Gujarat in the Gulf of Khambhat. The metropolis is five miles long and two miles wide and now lies beneath one hundred and twenty feet of water. It predates the IVC by several thousand years. Marine surveys show paleo river channels feeding into the area. This would mean that the city was originally situated in close proximity to one or more rivers. Structures thus far identified include uniformly-spaced houses, a bath, granary, citadel and drainage system.”

  “Just like here at Mohenjo-Daro!” Cassie registered astonishment. “How old did you say this underwater city was?”

  “Artifacts recovered from the lowest levels of the submerged area show that the region has been continuously inhabited for the past thirty thousand years but a city was first built in that spot thirteen thousand years ago. Wood taken from the top layer of the site has been carbon-dated at 7500 BCE.”

  “Then that city predates Mesopotamia by thousands of years.” The Pythia smiled grimly. “So much for mainstream history. It must have flooded when sea levels rose after the big glacier meltdown.”

  “That would be my theory as well,” the Scrivener agreed. “Global sea levels today are four hundred feet higher than they were at the time the IVC city was submerged. It’s quite likely that any survivors of that flood may have escaped inland and tried to re-establish their culture along another river valley farther from the coast. Mehrgarh may be one of many yet-undiscovered sites constructed by refugees from the sunken city.”

  Cassie scanned the lower town of Mohenjo-Daro. “So that’s why you said this is the tail-end of the IVC.”

  “Yes. The inhabitants in this place circa 1900 BCE were faced with a catastrophe just as disastrous as a global flood but more gradual in its damaging effect. The land which had supported them for thousands of years was drying up. Because it was a slow process, there was no mass evacuation. With each succeeding generation, small groups of people moved away to find a better climate. There are minor sites scattered through central and southern India that mark an attempt to rebuild but nothing on the scale of Harappa or Mohenjo-Daro.”

  “So you don’t think Mohenjo-Daro was destroyed by overlords?” Cassie asked.

  Griffin paused to consider the question. “By the time the Aryans first appeared in this region, Mohenjo-Daro was already in steep decline. It’s very likely the interlopers massacred the remaining inhabitants since there’s at least one mass grave proving a small-scale conflict occurred here. Then they would have exploited the scant resources which remained and probably became squatters in the city without having any idea how to repair or maintain it. However, I don’t believe they contributed in any material way to the end of the civilization.”

  “It’s a pretty safe bet that they took credit for a lot of the inventions developed by the IVC though,” Erik noted.

  “Sadly, that’s quite true,” Griffin concurred. “The Aryans appropriated the skills, technology and even some religious traditions of this older culture and claimed them as their own. Their ancient texts would lead one to believe that the newcomers civilized the backward tribes inhabiting the area. However, we are quite sure that the IVC was not developed by overlords.”

  “How do you know that?” the Pythia asked.

  “There is one interesting omission in their artwork which makes the strongest case. IVC seal-amulets portray a variety of animals indigenous to this region. Bulls and elephants feature prominently but there are no horses. Terra cotta figurines depict wagons drawn only by oxen.”

  “Why’s that so important?”

  “Because overlord culture is synonymous with the domesticated horse,” Griffin replied. “Find one and you invariably find the other. The horse played a huge role, not only in the physical migration of the steppe tribes, but in their artwork and ideology as well. It stands to reason that if the people who created stamp-seal art in Mohenjo-Daro were Aryan, they would have displayed horses everywhere.

  “Aside from the horse, we have one other important clue to the identity of the builders of the IVC. They developed a written script consisting of over four hundred symbols. It remains undeciphered to this day because it is not an Indo-European language. Its closest extant relative may be Old Tamil which is a Dravidian tongue. Modern Tamil is still spoken by the population that inhabits the southern tip of India.”

  “Dravidians were indigenous?” Cassie asked.

  “Not precisely, but they certainly migrated to India thousands of years before the Aryans did. The timing of their arrival is currently being disputed. Some believe they migrated out of Africa sixty thousand years ago and settled throughout the country. Most Dravidian tribes today are clustered at the southern end of India but that is hardly a surprise if the IVC inhabitants left to seek a better climate or were driven out. We know that Dravidians once lived in this area because there is a tribe still residing west of the Indus which speaks a Dravidian dialect. Even if we assume the Dravidians arrived more recently than sixty thousand years ago, they would certainly have been present when the IVC was in its infancy.”

  “That makes the Aryans the new kids on the block,” Cassie remarked.

  “Not to hear them tell it,” Erik retorted. “One of the few facts I remember about Indian history is that the oldest Hindu texts were all written in Sanskrit. That’s an ove
rlord language. Because the Aryans got to tell the story, they took credit for everything.”

  “It’s important to remember that the scriptures and epic poetry of the Vedas weren’t set down in writing until long after the Aryans had claimed India for themselves,” Griffin interjected. “The debate rages on even now as to how much Hindu culture is the result of overlord influence and how much is the result of the IVC. It’s easy to see that the caste system originated with the Aryans as did the subjugation of women. However, other familiar Hindu traditions may have been handed down by the IVC. For instance, one of the stamp-seals found at Mohenjo-Daro shows a man sitting in a yoga meditation pose. Some have argued that this is a proto-Shiva figure which means both yoga and a major Hindu deity did not originate with Aryans. There’s also the Hindu practice of ritual purification baths. We have the Great Bath right here which was used in religious ceremonies. Because overlords were never known for their commitment to personal hygiene, we can safely assume that ritual bathing came directly from the IVC.”

  Cassie chuckled at the comment.

  They lapsed into silence for a few moments.

  Erik glanced upward, apparently noting the distance the sun had climbed since they’d begun their inspection of the site. “I don’t want to be a buzz kill but maybe we should get a move on,” he urged. “We need to search miles of ruins and we’re burning daylight—accent on the word ‘burning’.”

  “Right you are.” Griffin stood and dusted off his trousers. “Ordinarily, I’d propose that we split up but given how much of Mohenjo-Daro is still underground, it might make more sense to follow Cassie and see if she senses anything Minoan.”