Archaeology means digging up the past. According to specialists in this field, the word archaeology comes from two Greek terms meaning discourse (logos) on ancient (archaios) things.
Archeologists study the material remains of human life : Pottery, tools, baskets, tombs, sculpture, the foundations of buildings - all tell a great deal about how ancient people lived. They tell how civilizations began, developed, declined and disappeared. By broadening the knowledge of mankind's past, this science gives a better understanding of man today.
Archaeology combines the excitement of a treasure hunt with the labour of a detective. Only rarely is a princely fortune in jewels and works of art discovered. More often the dig, or excavation, reveals bits of pottery. Sometimes clay or stone tablets covered with the hieroglyphics of a dead language are found. These require the most painstaking toil to decipher, date and assign their places in history.
Wherever the humans have lived, they have left evidence of their existence. Things of the past, however, may be lost and forgotten until chance or the research of scholars brings them to light again. Among the most important finds of all time were the Dead sea. Scrolls, Stone Age paintings in Lascaux in France, Pompeii and Herculaneum in Italy and Harrappa and Mohenjodaro civilizations in the South Asian Sub-continent.
Most great archaeological discoveries like the ones mentioned above were the result of scholarly research. Several scholars working at the same time rediscovered Mesopotamia in a few years. Sir Henry C. Rawlinson, Sir Henry Layard and Sir Mortimer Wheeler opened up the sites of these great discoveries and deciphered their cuneiform writing.
In the early days of archaeology it was assumed that without written records it was impossible to date the sites and objects associated with prehistoric man. Ancient written records go back no further than about 4000 BC. Coins bearing dates were invented less than a thousand years before Christ. A new technique has now been developed for arriving at the age of a piece of pottery. Deciphering early forms of writing is one of the most fascinating and difficult problems in the field of archaeology.
The book under review, which is an Urdu translation of the original work by Sir Mortimer Wheeler, provides valuable archaeological information about the sub-continent dating back to about 2500 years and covers an area of two million square miles. It is a study about the Valley of Sindh and its Civilizations about which the author has written so feelingly. Bedecked with a large number of photographs, the author has tried to explain different facets of archaeology to facilitate the readers in comprehending the science of this fascinating science.
Its rendition in Urdu is impressive and helps lay reader sin understanding the content of this valuable book. The publishing Book Home, which is known for producing books on a variety of subjects, should be patted for publishing a book on the science of digging the past - archaeology. The price of the book is within the means of a bookworm of average means. The college and university libraries will find it a useful addition to their inventories.
Name of the book: Waadi-e-Sindh aur Tehzeebain
Author: Sir Mortimer Wheeler
Translation: Zubair Rizvi
Publisher: Book Home, 46 Mozang Road, Lahore
Pages: 176
Price (Hardbound): Rs 160
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