Ca’ Foscari and Pakistan Thirty Years of Achaeological Surveys and Excavations in Sindh and Las Bela (Balochistan)

Abstract

This paper regards the research carried out by the Italian Archaeological Mission in Sindh and Las Bela province of Balochistan (Pakistan). Until the mid ’80s the prehistory of the two regions was known mainly from the impressive urban remains of the Bronze Age Indus Civilisation and the Palaeolithic assemblages discovered at the top of the limestone terraces that estend south of Rohri in Upper Sindh. Very little was known of other periods, their radiocarbon chronology, and the Arabian Sea coastal zone. Our knowledge radically changed thanks to the discoveries made during the last three decades by the Italian Archaeological Mission. Thanks to the results achieved in these years, the key role played by the north-western regions of the Indian Subcontinent in prehistory greatly improved.