A clay tablet from Harappa Wiki page with a "narrative scene"...We know (kind of) what is depicted on the tablet. But we have no idea what the meaning of the depicted scene is...Maybe animal calendar markers can help us understand what the narrator wanted to say...
"A person, possibly a man, with hair tied in a bun on the back of the head, impales a water buffalo with a barbed spear...In Later Hindu rituals, the water buffalo sacrifice is associated with the worship of the goddess Durga..."
"...On this tablet, the sacrifice takes place in the presence of a priest or deity seated in yogic position. The seated figure wears bangles and a horned and plumed headdress..."
"...Above the head of the hunter is a gharial, a small species of crocodile with a narrow snout that was once common in the Ravi and Indus rivers, but is now almost extinct."
The tablet pic and description are from harappa.com...
That's it...So, what can animal calendar markers add to this? To understand the meaning of this scene we need to look at the climate in India and the lifecycle of the depicted animals:
water buffaloes
If we look at the climate in India, we can see that the year is divided into two parts: wet part (Jun-September) and dry part (October-May).
So how do the depicted animals fit into this climatic chart? So let start with water buffalo. Remember my post about Mahishasuramardini, The killer of the monstrous Mahisha demon?
Here's the important bit:
"In the perpetual conflict between Devas and Asuras, in the battle between the gods and the demons, the Devas led by Indra (riding on an elephant) were defeated by Mahisha, the Buffalo demon..."
"...Dejected by their defeat, the Devas assemble in the mountains where their combined divine energies coalesce into goddess Durga..."
"...The newborn Durga, riding on a lion, led a battle against Mahisha, buffalo demon, and killed him. Thereafter she is named Mahishasuramardini, the killer of Mahishasura."
Sooooo... What does all this mean?
To understand this story we need to look at the animal symbolism found in it. Namely
Water buffalo (bad)
Asiatic Elephant and Asiatic Lion (good) 🙂
...And the local climate (did that already. phew 🙂)...
Indian elephants mate during Indian monsoon season...
Which is why Indra, the thunder and rain god, rides on a white (cloud) elephant...
Articles about elephant calendar marker, India: "Musth", "Samantabhadra", "Modesty", "Ganesha"
As for lions, Asiatic lions main mating season starts in Jul/Aug, which is why this time of the year is marked with Lion, Leo...This is also the peak of the monsoon season in India...
I talked about this first in this post "Musth". I also talked about it in my post about "Ardhanarishvara", the union of Shiva and Parvati, which produces (the tree of) life and the river Ganges.
And because it is the monsoon season that supports life in India, both Elephant and Lion are positive symbols in Indian mythology, and are ridden by good Gods/Godesses...Unlike the evil buffalo...
Why evil buffalo? Water buffalos, both wild and domesticated, are seasonal breeders in most of their range, and typically mate in Oct/Nov...Which is right at the beginning of the hot/dry part of the year in India...
This is the season of drought and death.
I talked about it in my post "The bitch of the gods"...
So the above story about Durga, translated from myth to nature using animal calendar markers goes like this:
Water buffalo mating season starts when elephant mating season ends...Mahisha, buffalo, dry season "defeats" (succeeds) Indra, elephant, wet monsoon season...
Spring and early summer droughts start...People (and Devas, Gods) start to despair. Gods assemble on the mountain (Himalayas start to heat up in Apr/May). And the updraft this creates starts sucking the moist Indian ocean air across India towards the mountains...
The Devas, assembled in the mountains create Durga, the Invincible one, the killer of Mahisha (The monsoon starts)...Durga fights Mahisha for a long time, until finally, she kills him while "riding on a lion" (in Jul/Aug, Leo, peak of the monsoon season)...
And this happens every year which is why this is a "perpetual conflict"...
Amazing...So is this what is depicted on the Harappan tablet?
"A person, possibly a man (!!!), with hair tied in a bun on the back of the head, impales a water buffalo with a barbed spear..."
I think that the person killing the buffalo on the Harrapan tablet is actually a woman...Durga...Why do I think this? Have you ever seen this figurine from Mohenjo-daro?
It is known as "The dancing girl of Mohenjo-daro"...More about her here:
Few interesting things about this girl: She is very young, very slim and has a bun on the back of the head (!!!). Just like the person empaling the buffalo on the Harappan tablet...
So, I think that the person killing buffalo on the Harappan tablet is a girl, most likely Durga...And that the dancing girl of Mohenjo-daro is not actually a dancing girl at all, but could be a depiction of a warrior girl, possibly even Durga...
So far so amazing...What about the crocodile? Gharial is one of three types of crocodiles that live(d) in India: gharials, muggers and salt water crocodiles...
Gharals being the only Indian crocodile species that exclusively eats fish...here is a tablet from Mohenjo-daro depicting a gharial with a fish in its jaws
Now remember my post "Makara", about the mount of Varuna, "a mythical being" which was sometimes (like on this 17th century illustration) depicted as a crocodile...
During the Vedic period, Varuna was "The Man", the Sky God who controlled "The Waters": sea, rivers, rain...As one would expect from a Sky god in India, where rivers are filled with the rain that arrives with the monsoon winds from the sea...
In Vedas, Varuna was also twinned with Indra, the Storm god, and together they are referred to as Indra-Varuna. In Rg Veda 4.42, Varuna explicitly states the connection between himself and Indra:
"I, Varuna, am king...I, Varuna, am Indra [too]"
Eventually, through some political machinations, Indra became the overall ruler of the skies and rain...And Varuna was officially relieved of his "water duties"...
But, the Vedic Varuna, is being revered even now as the God of Rain...
Check Makara post for more info...
So that would indicate that maybe crocodile has something to do rain too? Well of course...In my post about Makara, I explained that crocodile egg hatching occurs during June and July in gharials and muggers and July and August in salt water crocodiles.
Considering that the crocodile eggs incubation period is between 55 and 85 days, that means that the eggs are laid from around the beginning of summer, Apr/May...And the beginning of the monsoon season...
And as the crocodile mothers stay around their nests, and guard them ferociously, the sudden appearance of all these irritable crocodile mums on river banks is the sign that "Varuna the Rain God" is on his way...
Interestingly, on the Harappan tablet, the buffalo and the crocodile are facing the opposite directions...Buffalo (dry season) is departing (being killed) and crocodile (rain season) is arriving...
Ok...What about the horned dude? I think, based on his horns, which are narrow, like bull horns, and not wide like buffalo horns, that this is Shiva, the bull man I talked about in my post "Human-Bull hybrid" about this dude depicted on this Indus Valley civilisation seal from Mohenjo-Daro, dated to 2600-1900BC, now in National Museum of Karachi (inv NMP 50,214)
So that's it...What do you think? Please share it with others if you like it. It would mean a lot to me...
To read more about ancient animal and plant calendar markers, start here…then check the rest of the blog posts related to animal calendar markers I still didn't add to this page, and finally check my twitter threads I still didn't convert to blog post...I am 9 months behind now...
