That is the video of a 5000 year old submerged town —- almost a complete town with separate buildings, courtyards, streets and graves — in Greece. Pavlopetri was a harbor town which dates to between the Minoan civilization and the Mycenaean Greek culture, which coincides with the de-urbanization of Harappa.
“This site is unique in that we have almost the complete town plan, the main streets and domestic buildings, courtyards, rock-cut tombs and what appear to be religious buildings, clearly visible on the seabed. Equally as a harbour settlement, the study of the archaeological material we have recovered will be extremely important in terms of revealing how maritime trade was conducted and managed in the Bronze Age.” [World’s Oldest Submerged Town Dates Back 5,000 Years]
Recently The Archaeology Magazine had a feature on 12 great underwater discoveries — of submerged sites, Bronze Age ship wrecks and European ships —- and they left out underwater archaeology in India.
In 2002, in Mahabalipuram, “underwater investigations showed the presence of the remains of walls as well as large stone blocks, which seemed to correspond to the time period of the surviving shore temple. Excavations carried out by ASI in 2005 also revealed the remains of two structural temples, found near the shore temple.” Also after 2004, the “naval diving team, assisting the Archaeological Society of India, also discovered another structure perhaps a temple 100 metres north-east.”
Similarly the ASI conducted excavations near the Dwarkadheesh temple and Gomti Ghat in Dwaraka.They found “a structure of stone blocks with post holes to fit wood”, and “coins, pottery, pieces of bangles and toys”
Previous under water excavations revealed about 120 anchors. These anchors often had three holes of which the upper one was used for tying a rope and the other two holes for holding wooden flukes. The Underwater Archaeology Wing recently found what they call fragments of ancient structures. It is not known of it is part of a wall or temple and so it is classified as part of some structure. One of the structures consists of stone blocks with holes to fit wood and the age of that is unknown.[Dwaraka Update (2)]
Also, a circular wooden structure made of stone and wood was found. Murli Manohar Joshi claimed that finds in Dwaraka were 9500 years old, but science disagreed: some of the finds were dated to 2280 B.C.E.
JK,
Sorry for the off-topic comment/request, but did you follow the outlook debate regarding Wendy Doniger :
http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?262511
My own impression is that while Romila Thapar etc. got their understanding of historical methodology right, Wendy Doniger doesn’t even conform to any acceptable norm of academic rigor. The problem is that no one is going to read if I write anything refuting her; at best people will ask me “What axe do you have to grind against Doniger” etc. So I think it will be great if you can write up something to show that her writing is hardly more than a bunch of conspiracy theories.
I know criticizing her is not worth your time, but it might also be quite important since outlook etc. are giving her space. Actually, since Wendy Doniger is more Arundhati Roy type (just conspiracy theories rather than clear arguments), the most perfect person to do this would be Greatbong but I doubt he would have any interest in such a project.
I am sure you would have read Rajiv Malhotra’s two major essays on Doniger at RISA Lila – 1: Wendy’s Child Syndrome and RISA Lila – 2 – Limp Scholarship and Demonology. There is a book, Invading The Sacred which deals with this topic.
Yes, I have read the RISA Lila, but again I don’t know if Rajiv Malhotra will have the kind of audience you have. Only deadly Hindutva fascists like me read Rajiv Malhotra – others will lack the will or open-mindedness to seriously read it, while you have a very secular audience. Well, may be I am getting paranoid, but…