ANCIENT CITY FOUND IN INDIA

Archaelogists have discovered a 2500 year old city in eastern India that may have had a population of 25,000:

The remains have been discovered at Sisupalgarh near Bhubaneswar, capital of the eastern state of Orissa.

Researchers say the items found during the excavation point to a highly developed urban settlement.

The population of the city could have been in the region of 20,000 to 25,000, the archaeologists claim....

RK Mohanty of the department of archaeology, Deccan College, Pune, who is one of the two researchers involved in the excavations.

"The significance of this ancient city becomes clear when one bears in mind the fact that the population of classical Athens was barely 10,000," he said.

Not all are convinced by the theories surrounding the findings, however:

But some historians and archaeologists in Orissa have expressed reservations about the claim of the two researchers.

"At best, it is a guesswork. Without excavating the entire area of the fortified city, it is not possible to determine its population or periodicity," said BK Rath, former director of the state archaeology department.

"The actual area excavated so far is only a minuscule part of the city. How does one determine the size of the average family in a period about which very little historical literature or evidence is available?"

Such disagreements are what often help produce the fruit of truth in such situations. It will be interesting to see what comes out of the find.