Dr. Agrawala's present work largely represents his Ph.D. thesis (approved by the Banaras Hindu University) in a revised up-to-date form. He has brought out a most comprehensive and thorough analysis of the material on the worship of goddesses in the proto-historic and Vedic periods of India. A vast amount of archaeological evidence is carefully sifted and analysed by him in a truer cultic perspective as throwing new light on the role of mother-goddesses in the protohistoric cultures ranging from small agricultural communities of Baluchistan foothills to the highly developed Harappans.