The Indus Valley: planned cities, drains and an unread script

Grade 6 Social Studies Worksheet - Challenge Me

Circle the best answer.

1. Read this first

   Use this

   What can we know, and what can we not? (cards A to D). Card A, the Indus script, in our words: by 1992 about 4,000 inscribed objects, mostly seals, had been found. The inscriptions are short, about five signs on average. Nobody has read the script, and the language is unknown. Card B, weights, in our words: stone weights found in different Indus cities follow a regular pattern and match from city to city. Some scholars think a central authority set the standard. Card C, the basin at Lothal, in our words: archaeologists at Lothal, in Gujarat, found a large brick basin. Salt, gypsum and tiny sea fossils were found inside it. Scholars disagree about whether it was a dock for boats or a tank for water. Card D, a comparison: the Rosetta Stone, found in 1799, carries one text in three scripts, including Greek, which scholars could read. Jean-Francois Champollion announced his reading of Egyptian hieroglyphs in 1822.

2. 1.

   Card D says the Greek text on the Rosetta Stone helped scholars read hieroglyphs. Which find would most help scholars read the Indus script, Bo asks?

   • A long text with Indus signs beside the same text in a known script
   • Another stone weight dug up in a different city of the civilization
   • A great many more short seals dug up in the same Indus city
   • A book written much later that says the script was already read
3. 2.

   Card B says the weights match from city to city and some scholars think a central authority set the standard. What does the evidence show, Esme asks?

   • The weights match by chance, so there was no shared standard
   • One city made the weights and shipped them to the others
   • A shared standard existed, but the weights do not say who set it
   • A central authority set the standard, and that is now fully proven
4. 3.

   Some scholars read the Lothal basin as a dock. Others read it as a water tank. What do the two readings share, Jun asks?

   • Both are guesses that no evidence can be used to support
   • Both agree it was a dock and differ about how old it is
   • The dock reading alone uses finds that came from the site itself
   • The same finds, read in different ways about what the basin was for
5. 4.

   Card C says scholars disagree whether the Lothal basin was a dock or a tank. Which find would best support the dock reading, Kira asks?

   • A second basin of the same kind found in another Indus city
   • More salt found inside the basin, beyond what card C reports
   • A channel that joined the basin to a river or the sea
   • A modern drawing of how the basin might have looked as a dock
6. 5.

   Cards A and B come from Indus sites, and no Indus writing can be read to check them. How can scholars test a claim, Luz asks?

   • Rely on the weights alone, because they are the clearest evidence we have
   • Compare it with other kinds of evidence, such as objects and outside records
   • Wait until the script is read before saying anything about the cities
   • Accept whichever claim the largest number of scholars repeat
7. 6.

   Card B says the weights match across cities. If a central authority had set the standard, which result would follow, Milo asks?

   • The largest of the cities would have weights of any kind
   • The weights would carry readable writing naming the authority
   • Weights in each city would follow the same pattern
   • Each city would have a different system of weights of its own
8. 7.

   Card D says the Rosetta Stone was found in 1799 and Champollion announced his reading in 1822. How many years passed between the find and the reading, Noah asks?

   • 123 years
   • 33 years
   • 23 years
   • 2 years
9. 8.

   A museum label says "The Indus script remains unread." Why is that a careful sentence, Ren asks?

   • It tells visitors that the script cannot be read by anyone
   • It shows that the museum does not own any Indus objects
   • It says clearly what is not known instead of guessing
   • It hides the fact that scholars have not really tried to read it
10. 9.

    Scholars first saw the Rosetta Stone in 1799 and read hieroglyphs in 1822. What does that say about unread scripts, Tala asks?

    • The Indus script has already been read in the same way as hieroglyphs
    • A script that stays unread for decades cannot be read later
    • Reading a script needs just more seals of the same kind to study
    • An unread script may be read later if new evidence turns up
11. 10.

    Cards A to C report what archaeologists concluded, not what Indus people wrote. How should Zee treat those statements?

    • As reasoned claims from evidence that new finds could change
    • As settled facts that cannot change, because experts wrote them
    • As eyewitness reports from people who lived in the Indus cities
    • As guesses to be ignored, because the writers are modern people