- Long before the arrival of the Aryans, there flourished a civilization in the Indus Valley Basin (possibly around 2500 – 1700 B.C.).
- We know very little about their religion. No written records of them have been discovered.
- Knowledge of their religion is based on evidence from excavations of several cities, most notably Mohenjo-daro and Harappa (in modern day Pakistan)
- Excavations found some buildings, a large number of terracotta figurines and numerous carved steatite seals.
- The imposing nature of buildings suggest they might have been temples.
- Statues of female figures with an elaborate head-dress suggest a possibility of a domestic cult of mother goddess, but we cannot be sure about this.
- Possible that some of their beliefs lingered and got absorbed in the Vedic religion.