Bronze Age India

Bronze Age
↑ Chalcolithic
Near East (3600-1200 BCE) Caucasus, Anatolia, Levant, Indus valley, Mesopotamia, Elam, Jiroft Bronze Age collapse Europe (3200-600 BCE) Aegean (Minoan) Caucasus (Maykop culture) Basarabi culture Coțofeni culture Pecica culture Otomani culture Wietenberg culture Catacomb culture Srubna culture Beaker culture Unetice culture Tumulus culture Urnfield culture Hallstatt culture Atlantic Bronze Age Bronze Age Britain Nordic Bronze Age Romanian Bronze Age Southeastern European Bronze Age Italian Bronze Age Indian Subcontinent (3300-1200 BCE) China (3000-700 BCE) Korea (800-300 BCE) Upper Oxus (2300-1700 BCE)
arsenical bronze writing, literature sword, chariot
↓ Iron Age

The Bronze Age in South Asia begins around 3000 BC, and in the end gives rise to the Indus Valley Civilization, which had its (mature period) between 2600 BC and 1900 BC. It continues into the Rigvedic period, the early part of the Vedic period. It is succeeded by the Iron Age in India, beginning in around 1000 BC.

South India, by contrast, remains in the Mesolithic stage until about 2500 BC. In the 2nd millennium BC, there may have been cultural contact between North and South India, even though South India skips a Bronze Age proper and enters the Iron Age from the Chalcolithic stage directly. In February, 2006, a school teacher in the village of Sembian-Kandiyur in Tamil Nadu discovered a stone celt with an inscription estimated to be up to 3,500 years old. Indian epigrahist Iravatham Mahadevan postulated that the writing was in Indus script and called the find "the greatest archaeological discovery of a century in Tamil Nadu". Based on this evidence he goes on to suggest that the language used in the Indus Valley was of Dravidian Origin. However, the absence of Bronze Age in South India, whereas the knowledge of the Bronze making techniques in the Indus Valley cultures questions the validity of this hypothesis.

Date range	Phase	Era
3300-2600	Early Harappan (Early Bronze Age)
3300-2800	Harappan 1 (Ravi Phase)
2800-2600	Harappan 2 (Kot Diji Phase, Nausharo I, Mehrgarh VII)
2600-1900	Mature Harappan (Indus Valley Civilization)	Integration Era
2600-2450	Harappan 3A (Nausharo II)
2450-2200	Harappan 3B
2200-1900	Harappan 3C
1900-1300	Late Harappan (Cemetery H); Ochre Coloured Pottery	Localisation Era
1900-1700	Harappan 4
1700-1300	Harappan 5

World timeline

See also

• Periodization of the Indus Valley Civilization
• Iron Age India
• Indus Valley civilization
• Indus script