The Indus Valley Civilisation has become known as the Harappan Civilisation after the site where it was first discovered. Though its heartland lay along the Indus valley, its influence covered a much broader area; between Afghanistan and what is now Northern India in the north and from the Iranian border as far as to the east of Bombay in the South; an area larger than any encompassed by ancient Egypt or Mesopotamia, larger than modern day Pakistan. The civilization lasted, at its height from about 2500 B.C., but the question of how and why an advanced independent culture grew up in this part of the world is still open to question.
