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Lecture Notes

Welcome to our next digital lecture, a basic introduction to the people of ancient India. Here I will tell you about the development of Harappan civilization, as well as about its demise after the arrival of the Aryans. I will also discuss the development and nature of the caste system, the innovative social structure of ancient India. This lecture is meant to work together with our lecture on Hinduism, ancient Indian's earliest original religion, upon which India's caste system was based. Together, these two lectures will help you make sense of the assigned excerpts from The Bhagavad Gita, one of Hinduism's core texts. In The Bhagavad Gita, as you will see, the conquering Aryans created and justified a social structure based on the duty that each member of society owed to the gods.