The Pashupati seal
A horned figure seated cross-legged among wild animals: the most debated image of the Indus.
This steatite seal from Mohenjo-daro shows a figure with a horned headdress, seated with legs folded and heels together on a low throne, surrounded by an elephant, a tiger, a rhinoceros and a buffalo, with deer below and a line of script above.
John Marshall saw in it an early form of Shiva as Pashupati, lord of the animals, and a yogic posture. Many scholars now doubt that reading, but it remains one of the most famous objects from the Indus world.
It is in the National Museum in New Delhi.
More from the Indus
The world's first great public water tank, sealed with bitumen on the citadel of Mohenjo-daro.
A bearded man in a trefoil-patterned cloak, carved in steatite: the face of the Indus civilisation.
A bronze girl, ten centimetres tall, standing with hand on hip, her arm covered in bangles.
The commonest Indus seal: a one-horned bull before a ritual stand, with a line of script.
Long red beads drilled through with stone drills and etched with white designs, prized from the Indus to Ur.
Polished cubes of chert made to one standard from the Ravi to the Arabian Sea.
Two small stone torsos from Harappa so lifelike that their date is still argued.
Little bullock carts, whistles, rattles and animals with nodding heads: the playthings of Indus children.