Mohenjo-Daro

Last week we learned about The First Cities of India in our SOTW book.  The first section discussed river-roads, and why it was important for ancient people to live near and travel by river.  The people of India used the Indus River as a road to trade with others and settled into the Indus Valley so they could fish in the river, drink the river's water, and use it to water their fields. Along this valley were groups of independent cities (the Harappan cities) that had no great warrior trying to group all of the cities into one kingdom.

These cities were built around huge circular mounds called citadels, which were strongholds at the center of a city.  The citadels were very advanced for ancient times.  The houses were made out of mud bricks, they had toilets and drainage systems, the citadels had courtyards, wells, and even a large public bath so that everyone could stay clean and cool. 

Something unknown happened to the cities along the Indus Valley that caused people to flee.  For hundreds of years, no one knew that citadel cities were even there, as they were buried under sand and dirt.  Archeologists found ruined walls and even writings on the walls, but we have no way of reading the writing, and can't find any clues as to why people stopped living there. We'll probably never know for sure what happened.

The mysterious citadel city of  Mohenjo-Daro was built in 2600 BCE, deserted around 1500 BCE, and rediscovered in 1922.  It was located in modern-day Pakistan and had nearly 40,000 people living in it! This may have very well been the most advanced city of that time.

Our craft project for this section was to make a Mohenjo-Daro dwelling using air-drying clay.  I first got the red clay, which would have been perfect, except when we opened the container and cut into it, the clay was moldy.  Weird, huh?  Jake went to exchange it and said they only had regular clay left.  Anyway, Madeline started patting and spreading some of the clay out to be cut into bricks. Once it was all cut out, we placed them outside in the sun to dry.

 Meanwhile...... little buddy Travis finally fell asleep on the couch after feeling sick most of the day.

Here is Maddie being a good big sister and keeping her sick brother company while the bricks dry.  She even picked out a Spider-man coloring book for him when exchanging the clay.  Is it me, or does she look insanely big and he look insanely little in this picture?

And sadly, here is Madeline after she's come down with the same illness as Travis.  

Our bricks are dried and ready to be built into a Mojenho-Daro dwelling, but that will have to wait until everyone is feeling better.  Since Travis got sick yesterday morning and is feeling slightly better today, I'm hoping that Madeline will be feeling better by tomorrow.  On a side note.... this marks her first 'sick day' from school.  :-(