Lothal

The basin

The structure that made Lothal famous is a rectangular brick-lined basin, some 214 by 36 metres, on the eastern edge of the settlement, with an inlet channel and what excavators identified as a sluice for regulating water level.

S. R. Rao, who excavated the site from 1955, interpreted it as a dock connected to a former channel of the Sabarmati, making Lothal a port trading with the Gulf. The interpretation is supported by the presence of a warehouse on a raised platform nearby, by seals and sealings, and by the site's location on a route to the sea.

It has been contested. Some archaeologists have argued the basin was a reservoir for irrigation or drinking water, on the grounds that a dock so far inland and so narrow is impractical and that the sediments do not show what a tidal basin should. The dispute is not settled, and honest accounts describe it as a dockyard on the balance of opinion rather than as established fact.

The settlement

Beyond the basin, Lothal is a small but complete Indus town with an acropolis, a lower town, drains, wells and a bead-making workshop that produced carnelian beads of high quality, including the long barrel beads that were traded westward.

A cemetery outside the settlement contained burials, some of them paired, which have been discussed in connection with practices of joint burial.

Significance

Lothal's importance lies in what it shows about the Indus periphery. It is far south of the core zone, on the Gujarat coast, and it demonstrates both the reach of the civilization and its involvement in maritime trade with the Gulf, which the Mesopotamian references to Meluhha corroborate from the other end.