Greek Gods Vs Hindu Gods

India is a land of culture, art, architecture, and heritage. Not only these but India is also a land of many mysteries that are still yet to be found. There are many mysteries that archeologists found, which are vanished or been destroyed over time. One such mysterious land that came into the limelight is Dwarka. It is the place where Lord Krishna established his empire. Dwarka was an island in the Arabian Sea that is popularly mentioned in the famous tale Mahabharata.

Many historical cities in the world tell tales about the people, traditions, and lifestyles of the people who lived during that time. But do you know that some cities have vanished from existence? Yes, it happened over time because of various circumstances. There are many reasons for their inexistence.

Some submerged in the land because of earthquakes and eruptions. Some cities are submerged in deep water bodies. Some of these places are still hidden in deep water bodies. The question is can we see those real underwater cities? Some say yes, because of the advancement in technology and some say those are just myths and legends.

So, if you are intrigued by this kind of stuff, then this article is especially for you. There are a few cities that come into the list. Today, I am going to talk about Dwarka the greatest Indian city during the Mahabharata.

Dwarka - Legendary Lost Cities

Krishna and Kamsa's Battle

According to Hindu mythology, there was a demon king called Kamsa. He ruled a kingdom called Mathura (present-day Uttar Pradesh). Kamsa has a curse that he would be killed by his sister's 8th son who was Krishna. To escape from that curse, Kamsa decided to kill Krishna. He sent many demons to do the task but all of them failed in their purpose. 

So, finally, Kamsa himself decided to kill Krishna. So, he invited Lord Krishna and his brother Balaram for a wrestling match with demons. Krishna and Balaram had killed the demons in the wrestling match and then they killed Kamsa. The death of the demon king has spread all over the world. Knowing about the death of Kamsa, his uncle Jarasandha has pledged that he will destroy Lord Krishna and his Yadu dynasty.

Krishna and Jarasandha's Battle

To avenge the death of Kamsa, Jarasandha the king of Magad province called all his soldiers and the demon clan. With all his soldiers and demons Jarasandha invaded Mathura. Lord Krishna killed all the demons but Jarasandha escaped from the war. But Jarasandha didn't give up and again invaded Mathura. He invaded 17 times and in all these invasions Mathura people suffered a lot. 

To avoid this situation, Krishna spoke with his Balaram and made a plan to build a city on water, which will be easy to detect the enemy's attack. Krishna called Vishwakarma (the architect of demigods) and told him to build a city on water. Vishwakarma build a beautiful city that had never been made and will never be. The name of the city is Dwarka.

Also read: Ram Setu: World's Largest Man-made Tombolo

Post Mahabharata

After the mighty Mahabharata war, Lord Krishna visited Hastinapura. On his visit, he met Gandhari, the mother of Kauravas. She cursed Krishna that he will witness the fall of his clan and that his city will get destroyed. The reason for the curse is that Lord Krishna is the main reason for the death of the Kauravas.

After 36 years of the mighty Kurukshetra war, Dwarka was peaceful and prosperous. But the youth of Yadavas became hedonistic and frivolous. Krishna's son Samba dresses up as a woman and his friends meet Rishi Vishwamitra, Durvasa, Vashista, Narada, and other rishis who are visiting Dwarka. The young man playfully pretends a woman claims that he is pregnant and asks the rishis to predict the gender of the baby.

Reason for Krishna's Death

Knowing that this is a prank, one rishi cursed Samba that will give birth to an iron bolt that destroys the entire race of Yadavas. The frightened youth went to Krishna and said the entire story. Mysteriously, Samba gave birth to an iron bolt. Krishna ordered to pulverize the iron bolt into a powder and cast it into the sea. From the powder, erakā grass sprouted. One day a clash started between satyaki and kritavarma and the clash eventually became big. Satyaki beheaded kritavarma, and people on both sides began fighting with the erakā grass.

To save satyaki and pradyumna, Krishna takes up erakā grass in his hand in wrath. Later, Lord Krishna was killed by a hunter who accidentally found the erakā grass and made it an arrow. From afar he saw a bush that is moving and a red image was seen from the bushes. Thinking of it as a deer's eye he used the iron bolt and shot that. But he was mistaken Lord Krishna's leg's thumb to a deer's eye. This was the reason for the death of Lord Krishna.

Dwarka's Submersion

Lord Krishna predicted that this will the destruction of his clan. He sent some soldiers to Hastinapura to tell Arjuna about the situation in Dwarka. Also, Lord Krishna told them to bring Arjuna with them to aid Lord Krishna in the battle against his clan. Eventually, the fight leads to the destruction of the clan.

Hearing about the situation, Arjuna fled to Dwarka to save the women and children from the terrible conditions. But in the meantime, the hunter killed Lord Krishna mistakenly. After the death of Krishna, a giant wave rises and sinks the beautiful city of Dwarka. All the left people, the beautiful buildings, temples, and the entire kingdom submerged into the vast sea.

Dwarka's Exploration

The first historical record of the lost city of Krishna is dated 575 AD on the Palitana Plates of Samanta Simhaditya. The inscription says that Dwarka was the capital of the western coast of Saurashtra and states that Sri Krishna lived here. Pune's Deccan college did the first archaeological excavation at Dwarka in 1963, where they found ancient artifacts that are many centuries old.

Again in 1979, the Marine Archaeological Unit (MAC) of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) conducted excavations. They found distinct pottery known as lustrous red ware, which could be 3000 years old. This excavation is the beginning of the search for the sunken city in the Arabian Sea in 1981.

Between 1983 and 1990, they came across discoveries that cemented the existence of a submerged city. Many excavations happened after, in 2001, the students of the National Institute of Oceanography found buildings made of stones covered in mud and sand covering five square miles. They also collected blocks, samples, copper coins, and artifacts, which scientists believe are evidence for an age that is about 3,600 years old. Those samples are sent to oxford university for carbon dating, and the results revealed some suspicious facts that they are 9000 years old.

On the other hand, explorations conducted in the Gulf of Cambay waters revealed sandstone walls, a grid of streets, some evidence of a seaport 70 feet underwater, and artifacts dating back to 7500 BC. Among the artifacts, they recovered a piece of wood, pottery sherds, weathered stones, fossilized bones, and a tooth. Those artifacts were sent to NGRI and BSIP further, they found that the wood was carbon dated to an age of 9,500 years old.

Mainstream scientists maintain that the ancient Indian culture/civilization goes back some 5-6 thousand years. Saying that the ancient Indian civilization is much older than originally believed. Marine archaeology proved that the existence of the lost city of Krishna and its submergence in the second millennium BC referred to in the Mahabharat, Harivamsa, Matsya, and Vayu Puranas is a fact.

The implications of the findings say that the sunken city is indeed the legendary Dwarka and would be very significant for the understanding of what the Mahabharata is. The city would no longer be a myth and legend, but, at least to some extent, a genuine account of past events.

Conclusion

Finally, based on the correlation between the excavated structures and artifacts with the description of the lost city of Dwarka in Harivamsha Purana, and the fact that the carbon dating is around 3,500 BC. It is the same period concluded by many astronomical analysts as the period of the Mahabharata war and the submersion of Dwarka. Thus, the results have proved that the existence of the beautiful city of Sri Krishna was not a mere figment of imagination but it did exist.