Sir John Hubert Marshall (19 March, 1876–17 August, 1958) was the Director General of the Archaeological Survey of India from 1902 to 1931. He was responsible for the excavation that lead to the discovery of Harappa and Mohenjodaro, two of the main cities that comprise the Indus Valley Civilization.

Marshall was born in Chester and educated at Cambridge. In 1902 he was appointed Director-General of Archaeology within the British Indian administration, and modernised the approach to archaeology on that continent, introducing a programme of cataloguing and conservation of ancient monuments and artefacts.

It was thanks to Marshall that native Indians were allowed for the first time to participate in excavations in their own country. In 1913, he began the excavations at Taxila, which lasted for twenty years. He laid the foundation stone for the Taxila museum in 1918. The museum hosts many artifacts and also hosts one of Marshall's very few potraits. He then moved on to other sites, including the Buddhist centres of Sanchi and Sarnath. His work revealed to the world the true age of Indian civilisation.

Marshall was knighted in 1914.

External links

• The date of Kanishka, by JH Marshall

Marshall also failed to incorporate the basic technique of stratification, taking vertical slices at strategic locations around the dig to reveal the layers that accumulated with the succession of destruction and rebuilding of the site by generations of inhabitants.

1876 births | 1958 deaths | Alumni of King's College, Cambridge | English archaeologists | Indus Valley Civilization