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Until the 1920s, people believed that the first signs of civilisation in Pakistan had emerged in about 300 BC. Then, in 1924 archaeologists began to excavate the site of Mohenjo-Daro in the Indus Valley. These excavations brought about some remarkable results.
The evidence that the archaeologists discovered proved that a nreviously unknown civilisation that of the Indus people had begun as early a s 3000 BC. This was an exciting discovery, especially when the archaeologists realised that the Indus was a very advanced society. Some of the artefacts they found had symbols on them in a kind of script, but they have not been able to find enough writing to decipher what the sym
Archaeologists could see that the people of Mohenjo-Daro were quite sophisticated. They had large houses with domestic sanitation, which fed into a public drainage system.
Small flights of stairs were also discovered, which proved that some buildings had more than one floor or access to flat roofs. The buildings were made up of bricks the Indus people baked themselves from mud. They then plastered the internal walls with a layer of mud. In the centre of the city was a man-made mound constructed of mud and baked mud bricks on top of which the most important, buildings could-be found. These consisted of a large building where people lived and a very large and well-built bath, which must have been used for ritual bathing.
There were also the beginnings of what was probably a huge granary. The mound was fortified with square towers, and archaeologists believe that it housed the religious headquarters of the city.
The houses in the lower part of the town varied greatly in size: the largest ones were built around a central c tyard, and the smallest was just a single room with cooking and bathing areas separated off by a partition.
Thre were many shops and craft workshops where people made beads, pots, metal items, and jewellery among the houses. Nearby were buildings where fabrics were made and dyed.
Archaeologists found many intricately worked beads and bangles. By looking carefully at the way, these made it was possible to work out that some of the pieces would have taken up to two weeks to complete.
Around the city, archaeologists found the remains of a huge wall. Their first thought was that this was a defence against enemies, but further evidence in the city shows that the Indus people were never attacked and did not have any experience of warfare. It is more likely that the wall was built to protect Mohenjo Daro from the constant threat of flooding...
Indeed much of the information that would help us to understand the peopleof Mohenjo-Daro more fully was lost because of the abnormally bad flooding of the area. The floodwaters covered the site for a long time, destroying homes, temples, statues and artefacts.

QUESTION 1 In what way did the excavation of Mohenjo Daro lead archaeologists to change their views about
the early civilisations of modern-day Pakistan?