User:Indus Civ/sandbox

Introduction The oldest documented use of the Sanskrit language is the use in the inscriptions of the Indus Civilization ('Harappa Culture') from the time of ca. BC 2500 - BC 1900. The at least 2500 today known texts were found written on various archgeoloical founds at hundreds of sites of the Indus Civilization in today India and Pakistan, some in Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran. The used script is of the pictographic-syllabic type like the most archaic scripts, as well as several east asian scripts until today.

Contents The most texts contain short highly efficent statements of three till six signs/words. But even the texts of a one-sign-word linked to a picture contain a effective statement. The texts in sum describe many features of the Indus society, in the crucial point they show the Indus Empire as the vedic state before already konwn in the traditional Indian myths like Ramayana and Rig Veda.

Research The basic works for the decipherement as the catalogue of signs and the list of the 'pictorial bilinguals' - texts escorted by matching animal pictures - were done by Asko Parpola, professor em. University of Helsinki, Finland. The linguist at the German ministry of defense Kurt Schildmann deciphered on the basis of Parpolas works. The scientific analysys of the deciphered texts and publishing of the main documentation was done by Rainer Hasenpflug who researched for some years at the 'German Research Project Mohenjo Daro' at the Technical University of Aachen on the Indus Civilization.

Controversy The Indus Sanskrit texts caused in the last years in academic and publisher circles a wide controverse. Some scientific leaders of the academic field of Indus Civilization research keep on maintaining their individual speculative theories which are fundamental contradictory and try to disprove each other in all points. This situation makes it difficult today to develop the research of the Indus Civilization.

References (small Selection) Rainer Hasenpflug (2006): The Inscriptions of the Indus Civilization, ISBN 3-8334-4613-7 Kurt Schildmann (2003): Maya Transition Epigraphic Dictionary, ISBN 3-9023-0200-3 Kurt Schildmann (1998): Als Das Raumschiff 'Athena' die Erde kippte, ISBN 3-9338-1715-3 Asko Parpola (1987-1991): Corpus of Indus Seals and Inscriptions. 2 Parts EFODON Dokumentation

Websites http://www.indus-civilization.info