Horses/Indus seals

[Edwin Bryant]

In case my last posting was confusing (as it was to at least one person),
may I just again try to reiterate the point (I realize we may all be
growing rather weary of all this).

Just as the horse is prominent in the Rg, so is the cow.  So *if* the
I-A's were in the IVC, they did not depict either cows or horses on their
seals despite these being their two most important cultural animals.

The logic, here (from within the parameters of the assumption that the
I-A's could have been present in the IVC), is that just as the
culturally-important I-A cow is not depicted on the seals, but was present
physically (as evidenced by cow bones), so, in a parallel fashion, could
the culturally-important I-A horse have been present despite also not
being depicted on the seals (and although 'physically' less evidenced than
the common cow in terms of bones due to it being a rare, elite item).

I hope this logic is not as convoluted as my prose.  Obviously, the
alternative is that the cow-and-horse-centered  I-A's were not
significantly present in the IVC at all and hence the lacuna of *both* the
cow and the horse on the seals.   Best, Edwin