agate bead pro- duction and pottery manufacture

Some Indus settlements, such as Harappa, had massive walls and gateways,
but they may have been more important as control mechanisms to facilitate
taxation and limit com- mercial access or exit from the cities, than for military
defense (Kenoyer 1993, 1997). Monumental buildings have been found at
Harappa and Mohenjo-daro, but no central- ized ritual or political structures,
such as temples, palaces or royal burials, have been identified. This pattern
suggests that no single individual or dynasty dominated the cities for very
long, and that they may have been controlled by several competing groups of
elites, i.e. land owners, merchants or ritual specialists (Kenoyer 1994a)
On the basis of the most recent work at the Harappa in 1996 and 1997 (Fig.
2), it appears that the first settlers at Harappa established a small agricultural
village near the ancient Ravi River around 3300 BC (Periods 1A and 1B). This
location was ideal for agriculture as well as for access to rich hunting and
fishing grounds. The earliest village occupation is characterized by small
mud-brick buildings and skilled artisans practiced a wide range of crafts:
hand-built pottery, copper/bronze working, and making ornaments from semipre- cious stone and marine shell (Kenoyer 1991; Meadow et al. 1996).
At Harappa, in Period 1 (3300-2800 BC) there is evidence for two major types
of stone bead manufacture: hard stone beads made of carnelian, agate,
jasper or lapis lazuli, and soft talcose stone beads (steatite or soapstone). The
talcose beads were later hardened, whitened or glazed by firing in high
temperature kilns (Vidale 1989b; Vidale and Bianchetti 1997).
The finished steatite beads had been hardened and whitened by glazing and
firing at high temperatures and some of the long cylindrical beads were
decorated with a blue-green glaze. This glaze was probably made with
powdered frit and copper oxide com- bined with a flux from plant ash (sajji), a
process that is well documented for glazed faience (Kenoyer 1994a).