Only Indus site with artificial brick dockyard?

- November 27, 2021

Previous Year Paper GK Questions and Answers:Artificial Brick Dockyard

Pre-Historic Period-Question 25

Daily Online General Knowledge Quiz:Previous year paper gk questions with answers and explanation in English on Indian History of Pre-Historic Period.

25.Which was the only Indus site with artificial brick dockyard?
A. Lothal
B. Kalibangan
C. Harappan
D. Mohenjodaro

Lothal

Note: Lothal was the world's earliest site which connected the city to an ancient course of the Sabarmati river on the trade route between Harappan cities in Sindh and the Sourashtra.

It was famous for the trade of beads, gems and other valuable ornaments.

🔑Key Points

✔According to the ASI(Archaeological Survey of India), Lothal had the world's earliest known dock, which connected the city to an ancient course of the Sabarmati river on the trade route between Harappan cities in Sindh and the peninsula of Saurashtra when the surrounding Kutch desert of today was a part of the Arabian Sea.

✔The meaning of Lothal in Gujarati to be "the mound of the dead" is not unusual, as the name of the city of Mohenjo-daro in Sindhi means the same.

✔People in villages neighbouring to Lothal had known of the presence of an ancient town and human remains.

✔The dockyard was located away from the main current to avoid deposition of silt.

✔It is believed that Lothal engineers studied tidal movements, and their effects on brick-built structures, since the walls are of kiln-burnt bricks.

✔This knowledge also enabled them to select Lothal's location in the first place, as the Gulf of Khambhat has the highest tidal amplitude and ships can be cascaded through flow tides in the river estuary.

✔The engineers built a trapezoidal structure, with north–south length of average 215 metres (705 feet), and east–west width of 35 metres (115 feet).

✔Another opinion is that the basin could have served as an irrigation tank, for the estimated original dimensions of the "dock" are not large enough, by modern standards, to house ships and conduct much traffic.

✔The dock also possessed a lock-gate system—a wooden door could be lowered at the mouth of the outlet to retain a minimum column of water in the basin so as to ensure flotation at low tides.

Important Findings of Lothal are:

✔Dockyard

✔Port Town

✔Rice husk

✔Fire alters

✔Chess-playing

✔Graveyard

✔Ivory weight balance

✔Copper dog

✔First manmade port

*This Question is a part of previous year paper gk questions on Pre-Historic Period of India.