Speaking Archaeologically™

                    The Sevasi Vav, Vadodara           Click here for our Sevasi Vav Video In all of western India, you will be able to find stepwells, from the coasts of Karnataka, to the arid lands of Gujarat and Rajasthan. And then,  are  some in Delhi and Madhya Pradesh, too. They provided travellers with a place to rest, and prevailed as a place to socialize, as well as acted as a medium for storing drinking water (there is no reason to boast about the advent of social networking for you in the 21st century–the wise Yodas from the past did this). More than 200 stepwells are expected to be located in Gujarat alone today–making it very easy to picture their figures in the past. Their water storage effectiveness has helped local residents survive for hundreds of years, in the semi-arid  climate  and  seasonal fluctu...

“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.” -Robert Frost On a chilly winter morning, three bravehearts— or let's just say three girls from the Research Wing Delhi Group at Speaking Archaeologically—took upon themselves the task of exploring the baolis of Delhi. Though I might have sounded as if  we were going to fight a war in Siachen, yet it was a war with lax bureaucracy, nonetheless.  We started our job with the baolis of Mehrauli on a working day and on the 41 acres of sparsely populated area with almost no security, we were welcomed by a guard who looked at us as if we were loons. Our day was set, we were supposed to study about the baolis and compose a vulnerability report. However, instead of taking the trodden part we thought of digressing a bit. What could possibly go wrong with that? So, led on the road not taken by just our curiosity , we came across a sign board that read Bagh Nazir, ironically next...

The Manauli Fort, Mohali The morning of August , the day of the season’s first site visit carried with it a wave of familiarity. In the car, on the way to the site, as we were seated alongside a bunch of eager new recruits, memories from Batch 2018’s first site visit last year dropped by to say hello. The Manauli fort, located in a tiny hamlet in Punjab, approximately 15.5 Km from Chandigarh, was once a symbol of bolstering defence and Sikh pride. Several local testaments reveal that the fort was built sometime in the 17th Century, by a certain Mughal ruler. A century later, as the Sikh-Muslim enmity took shape in the form of several battles and Misls came to power in the state of Punjab, Nawab Kapoor Singh of the Singhpuria Misl clinched the fort from the Mughal ruler and encouraged his fellow Sikhs to settle in the area. Today, akin to an old man with several afflictions, it’s a desolate piece of history crumbling away amid state apathy The present state...

I am not sure where, on the priority list of the Indian régime, does heritage conservation lie, but it certainly does lie well below changing names and raising statues. Sitting atop a hillock, overlooking the lush green fields, lie the ruins of Rehlu fortress. Once an important outpost on the borders of the hill states of Kangra and Chamba, the once-imposing building and the small village below, hold stories of a vibrant past, but today, everything seems to have been forgotten beneath the sheets of the soil and spoils of the fort walls. The place had always been an object of fascination for me since I was a teenager, and was shrouded enough in wilderness to excite a bunch of adrenaline pumped teenagers, such as I was. Despite the fascination of many like me, though, it was never significant historically and probably will never be, but it was this place, in particular, that made me fall in love with ruins. Hence, this was the perfect setting for my first Member-run-Workshop at...