What a civilisation is

The chapter opens with the archaeologist B.B. Lal on the Harappans: their society 'showed how a well-balanced community lives — in which the differences between the rich and the poor are not glaring... In essence, the Harappan societal scenario was not that of ‘exploitation’, but of mutual ‘accommodation’.' Keep this in mind: by the end of the chapter you will see what evidence he read it from.

At the end of Chapter 4 we saw the first human groups settling down, farming, and developing technologies such as building, metallurgy (getting metals out of the earth, purifying or mixing them, and studying them) and transport. They were moving towards civilisation.

So what is a civilisation? In general, the word means an advanced stage of human society. Instead of leaving it vague, the book lists seven features:

• Government and administration, to manage a more complex society.
• Urbanism: town-planning, the growth and running of cities, usually including water management and drainage.
• A variety of crafts, from handling raw materials like stone or metal to making finished goods like ornaments and tools.
• Trade, both internal (within a city or region) and external (with distant lands).
• Some form of writing, to keep records and communicate.
• Cultural ideas about life and the world, shown through art, buildings, literature, oral traditions or customs.
• Productive agriculture, enough to feed not just the villages but the cities too.

The book asks you: which of these is the most basic, the one all the others depend on? Think about who feeds the bead-maker, the trader and the official while they work.

Civilisation began at different times in different places. In Mesopotamia (today's Iraq and Syria) it began about 6,000 years ago, and in ancient Egypt a few centuries later. In many ways humanity would not be where it is today without the great contributions of those ancient civilisations.