Mohenjo-daro: a city with drains, 4,500 years ago

A short history

The city was built around 2500 BCE and abandoned around 1700 BCE. At its height it covered roughly 250 hectares and held at least 40,000 people, which made it one of the largest cities on earth at the time.

It was laid out on a rectilinear grid, with a raised citadel and a lower town, and — the detail that stops people — a covered drainage system running through the streets, with houses connected to it.

R. D. Banerji of the Archaeological Survey of India identified its antiquity in 1919-20. Large excavations followed under Kashinath Dikshit in 1924-25 and John Marshall in 1925-26.

It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980 — the first in South Asia. It is also in trouble: groundwater salinity is eating the brickwork, and conservationists have warned the site could be lost by 2030 without better management.

Places worth your time

The Great Bath

A brick-lined tank twelve metres by seven and almost two and a half deep, sealed with bitumen, and most likely used for ritual bathing. The single most famous structure of the whole civilisation.

The citadel mound

The raised quarter, with the Bath, the so-called granary and the assembly hall.

The lower town streets

Where the grid and the drainage are clearest. Walk the main streets and look down at the channels.

The site museum

Small, and useful for context. The Dancing Girl and the Priest-King are in Karachi and Delhi respectively, not here.

Before you go

November to February; summers here are extreme. Reachable by road from Larkana or by air to Mohenjo-daro's own small airport. A guide is close to essential — the site is large and unlabelled.