[SunkenCiv]

Gwen Robbins Schug looks at a Harappan human bone at the Anthropological Survey of India in Calcutta

[Sherman Logan]

A classic example of archaeologists projecting their ideological practices into the past.

A University of Cambridge archaeologist Jane McIntosh had about a decade ago in her book on the Indus civilisation described it as an exceptionally “peaceful realm” where everyone led a comfortable existence under the benevolent leadership of a dedicated priesthood.

For decades they said pretty much the same about the Maya and the Anasazi, and probably other ancient cultures I'm not as familiar with.

Then they deciphered the Maya script and found they were as dedicated to warfare and public torture as any people in history.

And they found that at least some of the Anasazi were cannibals and quite possibly into genocide and human sacrifice. Why this should have been a surprise is beyond me, given the pretty obvious defensive nature of the cliff dwellings. But for a long time the PC view was that the cliff dwellings had nothing to do with defense.

These folks hate war and constantly reinvent the fantasy of a golden age in the past where it didn't exist. Often combined with the mythical matriarchal society.

All this of course tells us nothing at all about ancient societies and quite a bit about the modern idiots claiming to interpret them. They never seem to give any consideration to what would actually happen to a peaceful society in contact with a warlike one.

[Sherman Logan]

Also ties into modern Indian politics.

For some obscure reason some Indians find the notion that the Indo portion of the Indo-European languages were brought in by invaders to be degrading to India. I’ve never quite been able to figure out why. These languages were equally brought to Persia and Europe by invaders, and nobody in these countries finds the notion disturbing in any way.

But many Indians subscribe to the somewhat idiotic notion that the IO languages originated in India and spread by migrations out of India. Despite the fact that we have thousands of years of history of dozens or hundreds of migrations/invasions into India and none in the other direction.

[ModelBreaker]

NOOOOOO . . . Not Gender Discrimination.

[smokingfrog]

Things are a lot safer there now, as most of the unruly types migrated to the south side of Chicago quite some time ago.

[BIGLOOK]

The more I read of the practices of ancients and listening to the current news, the more I realize that we haven't progressed very much at all.

Go figure.....

[BenLurkin]

“social hierarchy, unequal power and uneven access to resources”

So what?

[BenLurkin]

And I forgot to add...GUILTY!