The First Ancient City in History with a Plumbing System
What if I told you urban plumbing began in the 26th century BC?
Morning shines on brick wells and dirt streets, illuminating a New York-like grid. The river can be heard all around town. And 40,000 residents wake in the warm glow of the Indus Valley sun.
A bearded man, draped in a robe embroidered with ‘clovers’, walks amongst the crowded streets of the Citadel. He watches a group of priests pass him, heading towards the Great Bath; they wear the same robes. People recognize this man, this ‘wise man’ with the matching bright headband and armband. They stop their games of dice and figurines.
They revere him because the wise man harnesses nature’s power.
Traders know their networks rely on him; the farmers rely on him for fertility and good rain; the agricultural economy relies on him; the Granary where all the food is stored, the Great Baths for relaxation, even the agricultural cycle itself depends on his actions. His spiritual connection.
He leaves the Citadel for the markets in the Lower City. They are bustling with artisans, grocers, butchers, and traders who arrived early from the neighbouring city of Harappa. Different languages and dialects, a cacophony of business dealings and transactions between ancient cities.
He arrives at his first destination, a 2 story brick dwelling. A ritual offering takes place in the street-facing rooms. A bull is held over a copper offering stand, sacred rites are being prepared by several family members, and a sacred liquid coalesces at the bottom of the copper bowl. Blocking the private parts of the home reserved for the family is a wall with a seal.
A Zebu Bull carved into a large stone seal. Rare in the city.
One of them sees the wise man in the doorway from the street. He runs to the back to retrieve a gift, a slab of meat and gold jewellery, placed together in a beautiful ceramic. Rising waves and scales pattern the pottery. The wise man graciously accepts this gift of the ‘Zebu’ family. He offers them a gift in return and shows respect to the powerful family of Mohenjo-Daro.
Even if this “wise man” is the “Priest-King”.
Across town, the Priest-King passes large brick houses and small brick houses side by side. Some are under construction, renovated or being torn down. There is no ‘difference’ here. Even if the priest-king has seen people hiding things, rare things like gold jewelry the ‘zebu’ gave, underneath their wood floorboards when they think no one watches. Priceless treasures of copper, silver vessels, and elephant tusks.
All of these things, the larger society could not know about, for appearance's sake that everyone here is an equal.
The Priest-King does not walk through neighbourhoods of the wealthy and powerful, the administrators or the craftsmen; he walks amongst the people of Mohenjo-Daro. Atop the carefully coordinated city, aligned with the cardinal directions, everything is draped with a front-facing facade: order.
Even the Citadel, a place for administration and political matters, is not exempt from businesses taking up shop to sell their wares.
Back in the Citadel, the Priest-King visits a friend's workshop. They embrace and speak of the weather. It will hopefully rain soon, the crops need it. The Priest King hears clambering and shouting. Seals like the one representing the ‘zebu’ are made in the back.
Metals and ceramics, farming tools, bricking for houses and wells, dice and games, terracotta figurines children play with; all made in the city.
Soon, the Priest-King asks to use the toilet. His friend chuckles and allows him to use his red-brick laboratory, knowing there is no way the Priest-King could make it to his own. Everyone in the city has a personal toilet, a wooden slab above a drainage pipe. Underneath brick floors and dirt roads, evacuations are carried through an intricate drainage network.
The Priest King thanks his friend, and they enjoy a drink from one of the 700 stone wells found in the city. Fresh water for all.
His friend gives him a seal depicting a procession. A horned bull led by the people towards a deity. Collecting the seal, the meat, and the jewels, the Priest-King arrives at a funerary ritual in the Lower City.
Underneath their floorboards, the family gently places a body. This is not a wealthy family, although some wealthy families would bury the same. The Priest-King brings gifts that both honour the dead and benefit the family. He is not here to officiate, he is here as a friend. As he watches the people crying and mourning, preparing to live both without this person and with them, he offers his gifts and his tears. The family graciously accepts them.
The Priest King joins the family in performing a final religious rite. Such is the way of egalitarian societies. Such is the sunset in Mohenjo-Daro.
The painting you saw above was what Mohenjo-Daro looked like nearly 4500 years ago. It is one of the oldest urban centers in the world, spanning nearly 500 acres; it is the best-preserved city of the Indus Civilization. The city was built in 2500 BCE during what is called the Mature Harappan era. Mohenjo-Daro, along with its sister city Harappa, prospered as one of the most advanced cities in the Indus River Valley.
By 1700 BCE, the entire city was left abandoned, as were many others in the valley. Its technologies corroded and decayed. A complete societal collapse and a mystery scholars still return to.
The most impressive aspect of the site is the intricate drainage pipes and pits that composed the sewage system. Using cylindrical shafts, which could withstand the pressure underground while being small, fresh water was supplied to the people in the city itself. These urban, cylindrical wells seem to have been an invention of the Harappan people.
Bathing platforms were installed in private homes and red-bricked custom-built bathrooms. A shallow basin sloped to a corner to guide the effluent into a gutter or out to the street drain. Water would pour down from the top. A latrine on the outside walls of these bathing platforms was fitted with a vertical chute for sewage, leading to a cesspit or street drain.
Everyone in Mohenjo-Daro had water and access to sanitation. This advanced system, along with the lack of a distinct state/civic center and evidence of a ruling body, leads many to theorize the city was egalitarian.
In 1911, the first archaeological work began on the city. As well as possible theories for the collapse of the city. One theory proposed by archaeologist Michael Jansen (who has written a lot about the site) stipulates there was a return to provincial life, evident by the disregard of maintenance for the Great Bath and Granary sections of the city. British archaeologist Mortimer Wheeler suggests an Aryan Indo-European tribe caused disruption. But this theory was deemed unlikely by his peers. Others suggest that the eastward shift of the Monsoon could have reduced the water supply, which prompted Harappans to migrate to the provinces, being unable to sustain the settlements. Lambrick proposed that eastward migration of the Indus River caused repeated floods leading to the loss of agricultural production.
We still don’t know for certain. The script of the Harappans remains undeciphered, leaving the hundreds of seals ineligible. Who was the Priest-King in society? Why did some have more wealth than others? These mysteries of Mohenjo-Daro occupy the minds of archaeologists.
And for any future archaeologists, I hope that you explore them.
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