Archaeology is a recent growth of Indian history. Professor M. Taddei has this to say: "Unlike classical archaeology, Indian archaeology has never shown a weakness for abstract systems of classification; nor has it ever regarded archaeological techniques as an end in themseleves and lost sight of its own first objective, that of writing the history of man. This is because in a country which has no historical literature nothing to be compared with the Chinese Imperial annals, still less with the Greek and Roman sources and the immense wealth of inscriptions which illuminate the world of classical antiquity archaeology is in practice the only available means of enquiry. Not only has archaeology introduced us to civilisations which were hitherto unknown, like the Indus Valley civilisation, but in much more recent periods as well like the case of Gandhara."
Although the institution is recent, it deals with ancient researches and is an important source of ancient Indian history. It was Lord Curzon who founded the Department of Archaeology and Sir John Marshall, the first Director General of Archaeology performed marvels by excavating the Indus Valley Civilisation Since then archaeology has done wonders in the field of historical research in India. The archaeological excavations give three fold evidences (a) inscriptions, (b) coins and (c) monuments.