Urbanization of the Ganga Plain: Culmination of Cultural Process

The Ganga plain labeled as ‘area of attraction’ was a potential region for growth with a conducive ecology—fertile land, network of perennial rivers and mineral-rich hills. The Ganga plain became the ‘cradle of civilization’, wherein emerged the so-called ‘second urbanization’ of early India. As per the early Buddhist literature, six cities, viz. Champa, Rajgriha, Sravasti, Saket, Kausambi, and Varanasi flourished during Buddha’s time. The urban centers of the Ganga plain were the outcome of uninterrupted cultural development that flourished across the fertile plain bordered by the Vindhya-Kaimur hills since Neolithic–Chalcolithic period. Evidence of socio-cultural and techno-economic innovations paved the way for growth and prosperity that manifested in material culture by the first millennium BCE. Echo of these cultural processes may be seen in contemporary literary accounts. The clan-based society of Later Vedic Age was founded on innumerable janapadas (settlements) which culminated into the sixteen Mahajanapadas (kingdoms) by the sixth century BCE. While examining the basic concepts of urbanization, the present paper proposes to examine the cultural processes and factors that culminated into full-fledged urbanization of the Ganga plain in the course of centuries.