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Craniofacial reconstruction of the Indus Valley Civilization individuals found at 4500-year-old Rakhigarhi cemetery

Abstract

Despite academic efforts to study the Indus Valley Civilization (IVC), there have as yet been no successful attempts to unveil the IVC people’s craniofacial appearance. We investigated the IVC cemetery area of Rakhigarhi site, which was estimated to be of 2273 ± 38 and 2616 ± 73 years BCE. By craniofacial reconstruction (CFR) procedure using computed tomography (CT) data of two Rakhigarhi skulls (A1 BR02 and A2 BR36), we successfully reconstructed the faces of the IVC individuals who were buried about 4500 years ago. This is the first attempt to unveil scientifically accurate representations of IVC people’s actual facial morphology.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported in part by a Grant of the National Geographic Society (Asia 21-15). The authors can declare that they have no involvement in organizations or entities with any financial or non-financial interest in the subject matter or materials discussed in this manuscript.

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Correspondence to Vasant Shinde or Dong Hoon Shin.

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Lee, W.J., Shinde, V., Kim, Y.J. et al. Craniofacial reconstruction of the Indus Valley Civilization individuals found at 4500-year-old Rakhigarhi cemetery. Anat Sci Int 95, 286–292 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12565-019-00504-3

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