Terra Cotta
The Indus Civilization was the earliest center of ceramics, and thus the pottery of Cholistan has a long history. Local soil is very fine, thus most suitable for making pottery. The fineness of the earth can be observed on the Kacha houses which are actually plastered with mud but look like white cemented. The chief Cholistani ceramic articles are their surahies, piyalas, and glasses, remarkable for their lightness and fine finishing.
In the early times only the art of pottery and terracotta developed, but from the seventh century onwards, a large number of temples and images were also built on account of the intensified religious passions and the accumulation of wealth in cities. The building activity reached to such an extent that some cities actually became city temples. In fact the area particularly came to be known for its forts, villas, palaces, havelis, gateways, fortifications, and city walls.
Read more about this topic: Cholistan Desert
Famous quotes containing the word terra:
“While the very inhabitants of New England were thus fabling about the country a hundred miles inland, which was a terra incognita to them,... Champlain, the first Governor of Canada,... had already gone to war against the Iroquois in their forest forts, and penetrated to the Great Lakes and wintered there, before a Pilgrim had heard of New England.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)