This site is now internationally known to be one of the most prolfic metropolitan cities of the Indus civilisation. Moenjodaro was one of the two major cities of the Indus civilisation. The mounds of Moenjodaro lie about 440 kilometers northeast of Karachi and 30 kilometers south of Larkana district of Sindh.
A beautiful museum established at the site presents a reconstruction of the old life featuring a representative collection from Moenjodaro and from earlier evolutionary periods of human cultural life in Pakistan. 
Excavation
In the late 19th century, General Alexander Cunningham of the British Archaeological Survey and his contemporaries discovered a few Indus artifacts at Harappa in the Punjab, but failed to appreciate their age. Even in 1922, when the Cambridge History of India was published, India was described as a cultural backwater until well into the first millennium BC.
However, excavations which began at Harappa in 1921 revealed monumental Bronze Age remains. The following year, excavations below the Buddhist remains at Moenjodaro revealed similar structures and artifacts. Interest was quickly aroused, and in the years succeeding, a number of excavators undertook work at Moenjodaro under the general direction of Sir John Marshall until 1927, and then under Mackay. The new discoveries were announced with some excitement by Marshall in the Illustrated London News in 1924 and were greeted with great enthusiasm. It was quickly established that the newly discovered civilisation had been in its prime around 2300 BC, the date of the Mesopotamian contexts in which Indus seals had previously been found.
After independence, the renowned British archaeologist, Sir Mortimer Wheeler, who was then archaeological adviser to the Government of Pakistan, restarted the excavation in 1950, but the operation lasted for only one season. He was, however, able to lay claim to another remarkable discovery when he laid bare the remains of a sizeable granary on the western limit of the excavation. This supplied further proof that Moenjodaro, like Harappa, had been a major metropolis. 
The high water table made further excavation difficult. The birth and formative stages of the Indus Valley civilisation remained a mystry until an American team headed by George F. Dales, in collaboration with Pakistan's Department of Archaeology and Museums, represented by Ahsan H. Nadeem, excavated the western fringe during 1964-65. The dig uncovered considerable structural remains but failed to reach the earlier levels, in spite of elaborate arrangements for pumping out water.
A salvage excavation on the eastern fringes of the site was conducted in 1987 when, while constructing spurs along the Indus, structural remains and artifacts were found beyond the previously known perimeters of the metropolis. These excavations, over 2.5 kilometers from the stupa mound, radically changed the idea of the fullest extent of the city and reopened the question of reconfirming its outer boundaries.
This excavation revealed that occupation continued to a depth of about 10 meters below the modern level of the plain because of the annual deposition of alluvial silt during floods. The lowest levels are thus below the modern water table and are still largely unexcavated.
The site
The site of Mohenjodaro can be divide into three areas: (i) the city, containing the residential quarters, (ii) the citadel, containing administrative and religious buildings, and (iii) the outer portion, consisting of industrial and commercial areas.
The citadel is situated on an artificial mound, lying towards the west and at a considerable height. Clearly the public buildings once standing here dominated the city. A ruined Buddhist stupa dating from the second century AD can be seen on its top from miles around. The inner core of the stupa is built of sun-dried bricks, while elsewhere, including in the monastic cells, baked bricks were used. It was this stupa which led archaeologists to discover the marvellous city of Moenjodaro.
The Great Bath
Of the buildings so far excavated, the most famous is the Great Bath. This fascinating building measures 12 meters by 7 meters and is 2.5 metres deep. It consists of an outer series of rooms on three sides and an inner colonnade around the pool. From either end there are steps leading down into the pool. Much effort went into making the pool water-tight. The kiln-burned bricks of the sides and bottom were set in gypsum mortar, backed by an inch-thick layer of bitumen, a mud brick wall, a rammed clay filling, and finally, an outer wall of kiln-burned bricks. Water was supplied from a brick-lined well dug in one of the outer rooms on the eastern side and removed by means of a drainage hole leading away westward.
Immediately north of the Great Bath across a lane was a structure containing eight bathrooms, measuring about 2 meters by 3 meters each, with elaborate drains. The users of these individual baths either lived or worked on the floor above. Quite possibly the users were members of a priesthood, or at least superior social groups.
The Granary
Immediately west of the Great Bath complex is a well-ventilated building of massive construction. Although only the podium of the large structure survives, the presence of features similar to those in the already discovered Great Granary at Harappa leaves no doubt of its serving the same purpose.The Granary is provided with a platform and staircase to facilitate the loading of grain.
The collegiate building
On the northeastern side of the Great Bath, immediately west of the stupa complex, is an unusual building. It has a square, open courtyard with verandahs on three sides and rows of barrack-like rooms, some provided with fine baked-brick flooring. Although the exact function this building could not be ascertained, the age-old tradition of attaching educational institutions to religious establishments strongly suggests that it may have been a "college of priests.", half the width of the narrow streets running north to south, were unpaved, but a drainage system embraced all parts of the city.
Private houses were constructed of kiln-burned bricks. Houses were laid out around an inner courtyard; no window opended onto public places. Staircases and thick ground-floor walls reveal that the houses had two storeys, possibly three. It is likely that wooden balconies overhung the courtyard. Each house possessed a well, and its bathroom and toilet were connected to the public drains. The houses ranged from two-roomed structures to huge mansions incorporating three or four courtyard blocks.
Advanced drainage system
Remarkable features of this city which deserve special mention are an elaborate drainage system spread over the whole of the city, the public wells, and the baths and Great Bath.
The street drains of Moenjodaro are all of the same general type, constructed with burnt bricks. In some cases, wider drains are roofed with stone slabs. Drains too wide to have been bridged even with stone slabs were enclosed by corbelled roofs. Some of the drains have been given a gradual bend at turning point in order to allow the water to flow without obstruction. Blockages appear to have been cleared regularly by using brick manholes located at intervals along the length of the drains.
Earthenware pipes ran from the houses, sometimes built into the walls themselves, to link up with the main drains. The pipes came in lengths which slotted into each other in much the same way as modern drainpipes. Water was provided by public wells in the streets. Today, some of these wells stand tall like chimneys.
