n the autumn of 1924 the scholar-archaeologist John Marshall made an announcement that, at one stroke, dramatically altered existing perceptions of South Asia?s antiquity: he proclaimed the discovery of ?the civilization of the Indus valley.? Within weeks, Marshall?s news was recognized as conveying one of the most monumental discoveries in the history of human civilization: the world over, it became apparent that this was on the same scale as the findings of Heinrich Schliemann (who unearthed Troy) and Arthur Evans (who dug out Minoan Crete). The Troy and Crete stories have been well told, several times over. But a detailed, archivally rich, and completely accessible narrative of the people, processes, places, and puzzles that led up to Marshall?s proclamation on the Indus civilization has, like the civilization itself, long remained buried. Now, for the first time in this book, we have the whole story, enchantingly told. Nayanjot Lahiri has mined and deployed?as never before?bureaucratic memoranda, colonial noting, marginal letters, and piecemeal musings within the institutions and in the work of individuals who collectively discovered the Indian subcontinent?s earliest cities