In three thousand BC there arose in the Indus Valley a mighty civilisation, more powerful than Egypt or Mesopotamia, that some today call “the cradle of civilisation”. Also known as the Harappan culture, it is the subject of many myths and legends.

The sophistication of these people has baffled scientists for generations, as Sir John Marshall put it,

“When I first saw them I found it difficult to believe that they were prehistoric; they seemed to completely upset all established ideas about early art, and culture. Modeling such as this was unknown in the ancient world up to the Hellenistic age of Greece, and I thought, therefore, that some mistake must surely have been made; that these figures had found their way into levels some 3000 years older than those to which they properly belonged .... Now, in these statuettes, it is just this anatomical truth which is so startling; that makes us wonder whether, in this all-important matter, Greek artistry could possibly have been anticipated by the sculptors of a far-off age on the banks of the Indus.”

But for all of its wonders, to this day the language of Harappa has remained impossible to decipher, with some authorities maintaining that they had no written language at all. And yet stories persist about successful translations that were made by various scholars down through the years, only to have them vanish or go mad shortly thereafter.

The Rosetta Stone for the Indus valley civilisation seems to be a jade tablet or tablets with transcriptions from various languages, hidden, some say, by thuggee cults or other religious groups, called the Plates of the Indus. Those who possess the tablets are said to become wealthy and powerful.

Should a scholar come across these plates, they will be found relatively easy to understand, and will in fact open all Indus literature to the reader. But that's not all they open, for these were left by six Indus cultist-princes of the Great Old One Cthaat the Dark Water as a net cast into the swirling torrents of the future, and any who read of them have their minds swiftly transferred back to the bodies of madmen prepared and waiting in 2500 BC.

The transfer of minds is agonising and rarely produces a complete intelligence at the end, and once there language and cultural barriers usually make it almost impossible for the princes to learn much useful information, but they gain enough to quickly improve their society above and beyond their neighbours, garnering immense wealth, glory and fortune.