Vol-6 Number-2 April 2021
Chief Editor: Vijay Kumar
Publisher: National Trust for Promotion of Knowledge, Lucknow
Mode of Publication: Online (e-Journal)
This article by Vijay Kumar & Husham Haider gives the drawing of OCP pottery pieces collected from different villages of districts Aligarh & Hathras. The potteries of all periods were collected from these sites. OPC being the oldest chalcolithic pottery, was selected for making drawings, so that scholars have idea of ceramics of this area. These have been compared with the similar pottery pieces recovered from the earlier excavated sites of Lal Qila & Atranjikhera. The OCP antiquities from the two sites provide the only exhaustive material for comparative study of ceramics of this area
This article by J. Bates, C.A. Petrie, R. Ballantyne, C. Lancelotti, K.S. Saraswat, A. Pathak and R.N. Singh explores Alamgirpur, the most easterly Indus Civilization site so far discovered & excavated. The excavators here, have demonstrated that it was occupied during the Mature, late Harappan periods and Painted Grey Ware period. The article does in-depth analysis of the archaeo-botanical data presented in this paper. It shows a complex story of plant exploitation at the site. A diverse range of cereals were used by the inhabitants of Alamgirpur, in line with many other Indus settlements, but grain pulses were used with similar frequency, which is uncommon. The analysis suggests that grain pulses may have played an important role in the diet and agricultural strategies used by the inhabitants of the settlement. The results here expand significantly our understanding of Alamgirpur, and our understanding of the transition between the Late Harappan and PGW periods in the east of the Indus Civilization.
This article by Prof. Amar Singh gives the evolutionary history of the pillars in North India. The wooden pillars were extensively used in ancient Indian architecture as these have been frequently mentioned in the Vedic and later Vedic literature. The earliest archaeological evidences for architectural stone pillars come from Dhaulavira. During early historical periods, the Ashokan, free standing pillars were used for writing royal addicts for promoting Buddhist creed. The free standing pillars and Architectural pillars can be classified into following categories: Yupa, Dhwaja-stambha, Kirti-stambha, Mana-stambha, Vijaya-stambha, Sati-stambha and Stambha used in buildings. This article gives the description of only structural stambhas noticed in different places of North India and describes their gradual evolution.
This article by M. Habibullah Khan Khattak & Dr. Nidaullah Sehrai describes and dates the Kapardin Buddha sculpture from Shaikhan Dheri. Prof. Ahmad Hasan Dani, during his excavation at Shaikhan Dheri in early 1960’s, found a small broken panel with surviving height of about 14 cm and width of 11.4 cm, carved in red sandstone in the house of a Buddhist acarya, which according to him is “an import from Mathura”. On the front side is figure of the Buddha of which only head up to neck and the right hand in abhaya mudra has survived, while on the back is a stupa. The description of this important find given by Prof. Dani is rather scanty. He had neither assigned any date to it nor placed it in a specific or tentative timeframe. Through this research, the two authors have made an effort to fully describe the sculpture in proper context and assign it to the date of 1st century A.D., on the basis of comparative study of this sculpture with other such known and dated sculptures from Mathura
This article by Vijay Kumar & Alok Ranjan gives the details of old and newly discovered inscriptions of the Kalinjar fort. These range from Kushan period to 18th century A.D. There is only one inscription of Kushan period at Siddha ki Gupha. There are a few inscriptions of 4th-5th century. The inscriptions/ graffitis of 5th-6th century are found in large numbers in the aris (scarp) of the fort. Graffitis are mostly in shell characters. A few shell character inscriptions are found around Kotitirth also. A few complete later Gupta inscriptions were found at different places like Third gate, Kotitirtha & Mrigdhara. Pratihar period inscriptions were found at different places. The large scale building activities stopped after Parmardideva, although a few temples were built during 13th-14th century as attested by inscriptions. The 15th, 16th and 17th centuries saw a great rise in the numbers of pilgrim records at different places.
This article by Dr. Shanti Swaroop Sinha gives the details of the process of the assimilation of the Vaidik-Purāņic goddesses in Jain art. The Jains were liberal so far as the assimilation of deities in respect of names, forms and iconography are concerned. The article deals with the subject with reference to the three goddesses namely- Sarasvatī, Lakşmī, and Saptamātŗkā. As Jain goddesses, Sarasvatī & Lakşmī kept their independent personality intact but they were place a little lower than Tirthankaras. The Saptamātŗkās were transformed into yakśis with a much lower place than Jinas.
This paper by Asif Ali gives the details about the earliest mosques of Islam which were austere and simple structures constructed with palm tree trunks and covered with palm leaves and mud. When Islam spread to different countries, ubiquitous need of places for worship was necessitated. The early mosque in any region were influenced by the indigenous architecture and later mingled with various styles. In medieval India, the early mosques constituted of hypostyle halls with courtyard, as many column were required to cover the large congregation space due to structural constraints of stone. With the passage of time, the spatial organization was experimented during Tughlaq period and later was modified to a single nave prayer hall during Lodi period. The single nave prayer hall was continued till Mughal period when mosque architecture reached its zenith. This paper aims to bring forward the spatial transition in design of prayer halls of mosque from hypostyle to single nave during Sultanate period
This article by Roshan Taqui emphasizes that the growth of plants on historic buildings and monuments is undesirable. These plants not only affect their aesthetics but may also damage and destroy the structure in the long run. In India, varied temperature and rain give strength to the sowing and growth of plants on the buildings. Consequently Banyan, Peepal trees etc., get their roots fixed into the joints on north or south sides of the buildings, where sun light and air are less comparatively to east and west. There are physical & scientific methods of weed eradication. But now removal and eradication of vegetation and plants from buildings by means of chemicals, is a complete and separate subject. Sometimes a sodium salt compound with arsenic or particularly sodium and potassium arsenate and Nitric Acid (HNO3) are used two or three times at the controlled intervals for this purpose.
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