Society Reflecting in INDUS SCRIPT

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The Indus script initially began with pictographs. When the total number of phonemes was exactly determined and specific syllables began to refer to animals, birds, small creatures and physical objects, there was a need to turn sounds into symbols. That is to say, the Indus society needed a written language to communicate with the outside world, even though the language was marking time at the isolating stage. As a first step, they pictographed the animal, birds, small creatures or the physical objects for all the syllables as far as possible.

In turning the sounds into symbols they took note of the fact that, though a syllable stood for a number of objects or ideas, the simplest figure was drawn for each syllable. thus, though ka stood for both peacock and turtle, the latter was pictographed for ka. Even among the simplest figures, the most usual and only those of economic value were taken note of.

The four varieties of 'fish', 59 na, 67 ha, 72 ma and 74 jha, indicate the profuse wealth relating to water. The 'bee', 53 bha indicates the production of honey in large scale, and the 'spider' 54 ba indicates the production of cloth. A 'men', 1 ra was the most active being in the affairs of the society. A 'watchman', 17 Na and a porter or bearer 12 Tha were remarkable otherwise among men, who served the society in a different way. The 'emaciated person', 47 dha indicates the asceticism prevalent in the society. They used 'dogs' 50 Dha for hunting, while 'hare' 51 sha was the domestic animal.

As the society turned towards the urban form, with the advancement of learning and technical knowledge, the form of the script changed drastically. The animal figures were left behind, though not totally abandoned.

This phase of the script is in the geometrical form. The language was still at the isolating stage, though the affix gha for future and ga for injunctions or order had begun to appear. Perhaps there was also the affix Tha for past.

Though some geometrical signs have evolved from the animal figures, the rest of them draw a picture of the urban life of the people. Not to speak of the squares, rectangles, and circles, which indicate the outline of the town planning, construction of the multi-storeyed buildings, and other objects of the material life, the most remarkable are the spoked wheels of various kinds. they represent c-syllables with different vowels.

Many monosyllabic texts of the inscriptions portray the hurly-burly of the town life : ra (speed) 1 allowed the traffic to go; Tha (disc) 12 ordered it to make a turn; STha (cessation of movement) 15 asked it to stop; ni 65 allowed a man to come in; na 59 was for no, and so on. Perhaps ha 67 or hao 69 was for rest or stand-still position.

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