Why is it hard to decipher the Indus Script?

So far, the Indus writing system could not be translated because the texts are too short, we have no bilingual inscription and we do not which language or languages were transcribed. Moreover, it is possible that it worked differently from any other writing system of the same general period.

Will we ever decipher the Indus Script?

In spite of many attempts, the ‘script’ has not yet been deciphered, but efforts are ongoing. There is no known bilingual inscription to help decipher the script, and the script shows no significant changes over time.

What difficulties have been faced by historians in deciphering the Indus Script?

It is challenging for historians to read the inscription those inscriptions that were written thousands of years ago as some letters may be faintly over time. Moreover, they can not be always sure about the exact meaning of the deciphered word due to the very fact that meaning of deciphered words changes with time.

Why don’t we know much about the Indus Valley civilization?

The Indus Valley was home to one of the world’s first large civilisations. It began nearly 5,000 years ago in an area of modern-day Pakistan and Northern India. We do not know what the Indus people called their cities, because nobody has been able to translate their ancient language.

What problems were faced by Epigraphists?

Answer: The problems facex by the epigraphtis were :

• The letters are very faintly engraved.
• Inscription may be damaged or some letters were missing.
• It is not always easy to be sure about the exact meaning of the word used in the inscription.
• Several thousand inscriptions are discovered but not all have been deciphered.

Is the Indus Valley Script deciphered?

Yes it is true the Indus Valley script has been deciphered. Even though my decipherment allows researchers to read the Indus Valley seals (IVS), due to Eurocentrism and the Hindutva my research has been ignored by the Academe for almost 40 years. In this way, why would Indus script not be deciphered yet?

Is there a bitext for the Indus script?

No bitext for the Indus script has yet been found. A bitext is no guarantee that decipherment will be easy. Take the case of Etruscan writing, found in Italy. At a superficial level the script is easily deciphered, since the letters are close in form to archaic Greek and Latin alphabets.

How many inscriptions have been found in the Indus Valley Civilization?

Since then, over 4,000 inscribed objects have been discovered, some as far afield as Mesopotamia, as a consequence of ancient Indus–Mesopotamia relations. In the early 1970s, Iravatham Mahadevan published a corpus and concordance of Indus inscriptions listing 3,700 seals and 417 distinct signs in specific patterns.

Is the Indus Valley script similar to Linear Elamite?

Scholars have also compared the Indus valley script with the Linear Elamite writing system used in Elam, an ancient Pre-Iranian civilization that was contemporaneous with the Indus Valley civilization. The two languages were contemporary to each other.