The Indus Enigma: Uncovering Common Ancestry, Cultural Exchange, and Redefining the Technological Capabilities of the Ancient World.

The Indus Valley Civilization remains an enigma in many ways. We have unearthed artifacts and sites, but we still cannot read the writing of the Indus people. For decades, their script has defied attempts at decipherment.

However, modern machine learning, large language models, aerial archeology equipped with LIDAR capabilities offer new hope for making breakthroughs. With enough textual data, these models can infer grammatical rules, detect patterns and potentially crack seemingly code-like scripts.

This project aims to leverage these techniques to make a serious attempt at decoding the Indus script and shedding light on a crucial lost chapter of human history. By feeding Indus inscriptions into powerful AI models, along with related texts in other ancient languages from the region, we hope to extract statistical patterns and semantic insights that could reveal fundamental clues about the meaning and structure of the Indus script. Any breakthroughs would open a window into the economic, administrative, and cultural life of this early civilization.

The inspiration for this experimental approach comes from an AI-fueled proposition that the Greek Periplus was actually authored by a fluent Greek speaking Egyptian. This highlighted the potential for fresh insights when investigating ancient texts with modern techniques and alternative perspectives. The former mentioned experiment would require extensive additional research to be considered factual in an academic setting but nonetheless resulted in more questions left to be investigated.

When an informal comparison of cultural traits across different ancient civilizations revealed many shared traits following similar timelines, it raised questions about the extent of seafaring and cultural exchange millennia earlier than currently believed. Could technologies have spread earlier than archaeology suggests? Were humans sailing around the horn of Africa and as far as South America as the parallels seen in oral traditions may suggest? C

The legendary migration of the Indus people and the "White Gods" hypothesis point to an advanced level of technology that remains largely shrouded in mystery due to our inability to read their writing. This project seeks to change that through utilizing cutting-edge ML approaches to decipher lost languages and ancient scripts at a scale never achieved before.

If successful, it could reveal far-reaching connections between the Indus Valley civilization and other ancient cultures, reshaping our understanding of human history. With enough data, computing power and persistence, machine intelligence could finally crack The Indus Enigma and start to uncover the common ancestry and extensive cultural exchange of the Indus diaspora.

Beyond just the decipherment of the ancient Indus Valley Script, there are other scripts that remain a mystery that could likely be beneficial to the decipherment of the Indus Vallery Script. this project aims to also leverage the same tools to decipher other languages that continue to perplex academics and researchers.

Scripts:

• Linear A: A script used on Crete from the Middle Bronze Age to the Late Bronze Age. It is thought to be the script of the Minoan language, but no one has been able to read it. -Vinča symbols: A script used in the Vinča culture of southeastern Europe from the 6th to the 4th millennium BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Vinča language, but no one has been able to read it.
• Olmec writing: A script used by the Olmec civilization of Mesoamerica from the 16th to the 4th centuries BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Olmec language, but no one has been able to read it.
• Rongorongo: A script used on Easter Island from the 13th to the 19th centuries CE. It is thought to be a religious text, but its meaning is unknown.
• Mayan hieroglyphs: A script used by the Maya civilization of Mesoamerica from the 3rd to the 10th centuries CE. It is thought to be the script of the Maya language, but only a small part of it has been deciphered.
• Proto-Indo-European: The hypothetical language from which all Indo-European languages are thought to have descended. It is not attested in any written records, so its existence and structure are based on the comparison of its descendant languages.
• Etruscan: A language spoken in Italy from the 9th to the 1st centuries BCE. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown.
• Linear B: A script used in Mycenaean Greece from the 14th to the 12th centuries BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Mycenaean language, which is a predecessor of Ancient Greek. However, the Linear B script is not fully understood, and some of its symbols have multiple possible interpretations.
• Old Chinese: The earliest attested form of the Chinese language, spoken from the 2nd millennium BCE to the 3rd century BCE. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown.
• Etruscan: A language spoken in Italy from the 9th to the 1st centuries BCE. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown.
• Proto-Semitic: The hypothetical language from which all Semitic languages are thought to have descended. It is not attested in any written records, so its existence and structure are based on the comparison of its descendant languages.
• Burushaski: A language spoken in northern Pakistan. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown.
• Elamite: A language spoken in southwestern Iran from the 3rd millennium BCE to the 1st century CE. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown.
• Hattic: A language spoken in central Anatolia from the 3rd to the 2nd millennium BCE. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown.
• Khoisan: A family of languages spoken in southern Africa. The Khoisan languages are characterized by their use of clicks, which are not found in any other languages.
• Hittite: A language spoken in Anatolia from the 2nd millennium BCE to the 1st century BCE. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown. However, Hittite is important because it is one of the few languages that we know about that was spoken in Anatolia before the arrival of the Indo-European languages.
• Hurrian: A language spoken in northern Mesopotamia from the 3rd to the 1st millennium BCE. It is not closely related to any other known language, so its meaning is largely unknown. However, Hurrian is important because it was spoken by a number of important civilizations in the ancient Near East, including the Mitanni and the Hurrians.
• Mycenaean Greek: The earliest attested form of the Greek language, spoken in Mycenaean Greece from the 14th to the 12th centuries BCE. It is closely related to Classical Greek, but it is different enough that it is considered a separate language.
• Ugaritic: A language spoken in ancient Ugarit, a city-state in what is now Syria. It is closely related to the Canaanite languages, such as Hebrew and Phoenician. However, Ugaritic is unique in its use of a syllabic script, which makes it easier to read and write than other Canaanite languages.
• Kharosthi script: A script used in ancient India and Central Asia from the 3rd century BCE to the 7th century CE. It is thought to be the ancestor of the Gupta script, but its meaning is largely unknown.
• Old Persian cuneiform: A script used in ancient Persia from the 6th century BCE to the 3rd century CE. It is thought to be the ancestor of the modern Persian script, but its meaning is largely unknown.
• Cypro-Minoan script: A script used on Cyprus from the 15th to the 11th centuries BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Cypro-Minoan language, but no one has been able to read it.
• Isthmian script: A script used in Greece from the 7th to the 5th centuries BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Isthmian language, but no one has been able to read it.
• Lepenski Vir script: A script used by the Lepenski Vir culture in what is now Serbia from the 6th to the 5th millennium BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Lepenski Vir language, but no one has been able to read it.
• Khitan script: A script used by the Khitan people in what is now Mongolia and China from the 10th to the 13th centuries CE. It is thought to be the script of the Khitan language, but no one has been able to read it.
• Old North Arabian script: A script used in ancient North Arabia from the 8th to the 4th centuries BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Old North Arabian language, but no one has been able to read it.
• Wadi el-Hol script: A script used in ancient Egypt from the 6th to the 4th millennia BCE. It is thought to be the script of the Wadi el-Hol language, but no one has been able to read it.

Enigmatic Inscriptions and Manuscripts:

• Sitovo inscription: A stone inscription found in Bulgaria that is written in an unknown script and language. The inscription is thought to be from the 6th century BCE, but its author and purpose are unknown.
• Singapore stone: A stone tablet found in Singapore that is written in an unknown script and language. The inscription is thought to be from the 1st century CE, but its author and purpose are unknown.
• Phaistos Disc: A clay disc found in Crete with a spiral of undeciphered symbols. It is thought to be a religious text, but its meaning is unknown.
• The Voynich manuscript: A mysterious handwritten codex that is written in an unknown script and language. The manuscript is thought to be from the 15th century CE, but its author and purpose are unknown. It is one of the most studied and mysterious artifacts in the world.

In addition to the decipherment and linguistic research aiming to be accomplished, these tasks will also require hard evidence as this is not a task that is exclusively linguistic in nature. To paint the picture in a way that is irrefutably academic, and rooted strongly in facts there will need to be further connections made to support the findings. For example, some of the earliest balance scales can be attributed to the IVC, not surprisingly examples from other ancient sources are found in areas that would be well within reach for a technologically advanced ancient seafaring people. It is not ridiculous to imagine that could be a result of a civilization discovering this technology, and expanding their trade routes as they become more profitable due to the advancees.

Other curiousities that may be brought to a higher understanding through this research could likely be a deeper understanding of the seemingly "simotaneous" entry into the bronze age at multiple locations around the world. Is it more likely that humans happened to stumble accross the cutting edge technology of the time that was working copper. Not only is copper smelting a fairly complex task today, but ancient peoples in detatched locations also seemed to have an understanding of the purity of copper they were working with and the traits the different alloys would produce, and how to leverage those traits to their advantage by forming appropriate tools with appropriate alloys.

There is a seemingly endless list of "coincidences" such as the ones mentioned that require further investigation that can now be amplified through the use of artificial intelligence. This is a multidisciplinary labor of love that I recently have come to terms with being outside the capabilities of just a single sole researcher so I have open sourced the effort in hopes to inspire others in joining me on a journey that could very likely have us re-examining our total understanding of the ancient world.

From a more abstract point of view, I personally believe this type of research could also result in elevated world peace as modern cultures and the people that make up those cultures, countries, religions, and other various demographics are given a common link that could be inspiration for finding other common grounds. However due to the nature of the research I will keep my ideological stance on the matter to a minimum. It will not be completely ignored though as just like the task requires a multidisciplinary approach, it can also result in multifaceted implications.