12,000 year old megalith circles turn knowledge of ancient humans upside down

In summary, this is an incredibly significant discovery that challenges our understanding of human development.
  • #1
Evo
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This is incredible. This archaeological find predates Stonehenge and the Great pyramids by 6,000 years and makes Stonhenge look like rubble in comparison to this 12,000 year old find. It's before stoneage man had agriculture, before the wheel, a time of hunter gatherers. This site brings up so many questions and completely undoes what we believed about early humans.

The National Geographic special will be repeated http://natgeotv.com.au/tv/cradle-of-the-gods/episodes.aspx You should watch if at all posible.

You can see some of the site here, just click on the circles to advance.

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/multimedia/photos/?c=y&articleID=30706129&page=1

http://desmond.imageshack.us/Himg441/scaled.php?server=441&filename=gobeklitepe.jpg&res=medium [Broken]

Six miles from Urfa, an ancient city in southeastern Turkey, Klaus Schmidt has made one of the most startling archaeological discoveries of our time: massive carved stones about 11,000 years old, crafted and arranged by prehistoric people who had not yet developed metal tools or even pottery. The megaliths predate Stonehenge by some 6,000 years. The place is called Gobekli Tepe, and Schmidt, a German archaeologist who has been working here more than a decade, is convinced it's the site of the world's oldest temple.


Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/gobekli-tepe.html#ixzz1nvW5k281
 
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  • #2
Now seen as early evidence of prehistoric worship, the hilltop site was previously shunned by researchers as nothing more than a medieval cemetery.
Cool find, Evo.

Some peoples have revered vultures for carrying the flesh of the dead to the heavens.
Jains or Zoroastrians, for instance.


At death, great care is taken to avoid pollution from the body, and funeral services usually take place within twenty-four hours. The dead are then disposed of by exposure to vultures on large, circular "towers of silence" (dakhma ). Most rituals take place in the home or in special pavilions; congregational worship at fire temples is limited to spring and autumn festivals.
http://www.photius.com/religion/india_zoroastrianism.html

It is an interseting potential tie between peoples of Anatolia, Persia and Gujarat.
 
  • #3
Wow. I'm reading the article now.

I want to know how they made the carvings - with what tools? They would need a material harder than the stone...do we have any geologists here :biggrin:? Bone wouldn't be hard enough, would it? How about horn, or maybe even ivory?

If they used another kind of stone, wouldn't those tools be around?

Edit -

OK I read further:

Even without metal chisels or hammers, prehistoric masons wielding flint tools could have chipped away at softer limestone outcrops, shaping them into pillars on the spot before carrying them a few hundred yards to the summit and lifting them upright.

So it's soft limestone that they carved.
 
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  • #4
Astronuc said:
Jains or Zoroastrians, for instance.


http://www.photius.com/religion/india_zoroastrianism.html

It is an interseting potential tie between peoples of Anatolia, Persia and Gujarat.
Oh, no, that has nothing to do with this find. This is unbelievable, if you can manage to watch the Nat Geo special, you will be stunned. It's unlike anything else on earth.
 
  • #5
Evo said:
Oh, no, that has nothing to do with this find. This is unbelievable, if you can manage to watch the Nat Geo special, you will be stunned. It's unlike anything else on earth.
I'm not so sure.

I'm interested in certain cultural practices that show up across central Asia.

My time frame is upper Paleolithic/Neolithic to Copper (chalcolithic) and Bronze Ages (Hittites) and the transition to the point from stone to parchment.
 
  • #6
Astronuc said:
I'm not so sure.

I'm interested in certain cultural practices that show up across central Asia.

My time frame is upper Paleolithic/Neolithic to Copper (chalcolithic) and Bronze Ages (Hittites) and the transition to the point from stone to parchment.
Watch the show and you'll see what this find involves.
 
  • #7
This is absolutely fantastic!
Also, it vindicates a point I believe Lewis Mumford once made in his book on "The City", namely that cities grew up around a site of pilgrimage or sensed holiness, rather than getting imbued with sacral meaning afterwards.
Of course, that doesn't mean that there cannot have been cities with more humdrum beginnings, but that we need to acknowledge that cities and sites could serve many different purposes, anyone of which could be the starting point (rather than that it had to have a "crude" materialistic origin).
 
  • #8
lisab said:
Wow. I'm reading the article now.

I want to know how they made the carvings - with what tools? They would need a material harder than the stone...do we have any geologists here :biggrin:? Bone wouldn't be hard enough, would it? How about horn, or maybe even ivory?

If they used another kind of stone, wouldn't those tools be around?

Edit -

OK I read further:



So it's soft limestone that they carved.

The type of sculpting is the most laborious possible: the figures stand proud from the background, which means the whole of the background had to be chipped back.

Generally, all the t-shaped slabs look "eyeballed" rather than carefully measured. There doesn't seem to be any particular knowledge of geometry, and it looks like the dimensions differ from one to the other. What bothers me about them is that they're top-heavy. Both visually and literally. It's hard to imagine why anyone would adopt that shape.

The diagonal strip of "ribbon" that's very noticeable on the one stands out for being neither geometric nor decorative, as if it's meant to depict something real (a leather strap maybe?)

The upside-down squirrel-with-teeth looking thing in the third photo looks extremely medieval in style to me, while none of the other figures do.

Except for the one slab with a lot of carving on it, all the others are sparsely carved. One slab, one animal, as if the point of the slab was dedication to that animal (or what it stood for).
 
  • #9
A couple more articles

http://www.archaeology.org/0811/abstracts/turkey.html

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text

From a course on Anthropology
http://www.cas.umt.edu/anthropology/courses/anth254/documents/ANTH254NeolithicJerichoandCatalhoyuk.ppt [Broken]

for some context
http://www.cas.umt.edu/anthropology/courses/anth254/ [Broken]
 
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  • #10
How did they come to the conclusion they were no metal instruments or other tools ?

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2011/06/gobekli-tepe/mann-text
 
  • #12
Here are some great shots of the excavation.

http://miscellaneous-pics.blogspot.com/2011/02/gobekli-tepe.html

If you can get Nat Geo, the show will be repeated tomorrow, Sunday, & Monday.

Saturday, 3 March 8:30pm
Sunday, 4 March 12:30pm
Monday, 5 March 9:30am

Check your local tv guide since they don't say which time zone.
 
  • #13
  • #14
Astronuc said:
http://www.photius.com/religion/india_zoroastrianism.html

It is an interseting potential tie between peoples of Anatolia, Persia and Gujarat.

I agree with Astronuc that this could be a dakhma tower of silence. India is not that far from Persia. Has there been any DNA testing of those peoples to see if there are ancient ties?
 
  • #15
Ms Music said:
I agree with Astronuc that this could be a dakhma tower of silence. India is not that far from Persia. Has there been any DNA testing of those peoples to see if there are ancient ties?
They are circles of pillars, like stonehenge, except much more intricate. They are also 12,000 years old. That predates dakhmas by 9,000 years, as far as I can find.

Also, oddly, their descendants buried the circles of pillars completely, creating an enormous hill, so no one thousands of years later would even know about them, so I don't see how any knowledge could be passed down to descendents that might have moved to India so far in the future.
 
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  • #16
Not to dim the awe at all, but this reminds me of Carl Sagan's Cosmos series on PBS decades ago, and the remarks of the incredible amount of scientific knowledge and progress that was made /and lost/ in the ancient eras, that -- in some cases -- took millenia to re-learn.

For instance, among the scrolls was a collection recording an experiment in Egypt, thousands of years before Christopher Columbus, which proved the world is round, not flat. There was also a heliocentric model of the solar system, millenia before Galileo.

What if there had not been the setback generated by the loss of such knowledge, probably nowhere more dramatic than the destruction of the Great Library? Imagine how much farther along we could be today if we had not lost and taken so long to re-discover the world being round and the notion of the Earth revolving around the sun instead of the other way around. Its mind-boggling ...
 
  • #17
Evo said:
They are circles of pillars, like stonehenge, except much more intricate. They are also 12,000 years old.
National Geographic Channel is not in the basic cable package. I can't watch the show.

How are they dating the things?
 
  • #18
zoobyshoe said:
National Geographic Channel is not in the basic cable package. I can't watch the show.

How are they dating the things?

I don't have it either, but I copied and pasted the site name from one of the links in the OP, did a wikipedia search and found this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gobekli_Tepe#Dating

Which describes good old radiocarbon-dating as the leading factor used to derive an age estimate.
 
  • #19
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away".


Percy Bysshe Shelley » Ozymandias
 
  • #20
The Nat Geo HD channel on DirecTV shows the earliest showing 3/8.
 
  • #21
zoobyshoe said:
National Geographic Channel is not in the basic cable package. I can't watch the show.
Hopefully after it finishes airing, they will put the epsiode online.
 
  • #22
HowardVAgnew said:
For instance, among the scrolls was a collection recording an experiment in Egypt, thousands of years before Christopher Columbus, which proved the world is round, not flat.

This is a common misconception, but the notion that medievals thought the Earth was flat is a modern American myth. The anti-clerical Washington Irving, among others, perpetuated this myth as an attack on the "idiocy" of the organized religion.
 
  • #23
HowardVAgnew said:
I don't have it either, but I copied and pasted the site name from one of the links in the OP, did a wikipedia search and found this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gobekli_Tepe#Dating

Which describes good old radiocarbon-dating as the leading factor used to derive an age estimate.
Thanks!

So, they're dating charcoal from household fires.
 
  • #24
PJ524 said:
This is a common misconception, but the notion that medievals thought the Earth was flat is a modern American myth. The anti-clerical Washington Irving, among others, perpetuated this myth as an attack on the "idiocy" of the organized religion.

I think you had to have a certain amount of education to understand the world was not flat. I recall reading that Columbus had to hide his destination from his crew; that the common sailor of the day thought you could only sail so far and you'd fall off the edge of the earth.
 
  • #26
HowardVAgnew said:
... There was also a heliocentric model of the solar system, millenia before Galileo.

What if there had not been the setback generated by the loss of such knowledge, probably nowhere more dramatic than the destruction of the Great Library? ...

Hellenistic science (or say Greek around the 300 year period 400-100 BC) was indeed wonderful. It's not the topic here in this thread, so I'm reluctant to say anything more. You can start a separate thread about it if you want. The impressive heliocentric model of Aristarchus is discussed here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristarchus_of_Samos
Sagan's book is a good source but you might get additional detail from Wikipedia, e.g.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antikythera_mechanism
The fairly accurate measurement of the circumf. of the Earth was by Eratosthenes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eratosthenes
who incidentally was in charge of the Great Library at Alexandria for a time.
Wikipedia is not always the most reliable but it's often quite good and at least somewhere to start.

But this is not news to you :biggrin:. You already gave us the Wikipedia link for GOBEKLI TEPE
HowardVAgnew said:
... but I copied and pasted the site name from one of the links in the OP, did a wikipedia search and found this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gobekli_Tepe#Dating
...
It's a pretty informative article, not just that section on establishing the dates. Thanks.
 
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  • #27
Evo said:
Assuming the models are more or less accurate, they show how 'un-geometric' these things were. The layout has a Hundertwasser feel to it, naive and childlike:

http://www.masterworksfineart.com/inventory/hundertwasser/

Inner walls relate to outer walls in a completely freehand way. At the same time there's a celebration of the ability to shape stone, there's no over-riding principle of symmetry behind any of it. (There's no sense they even knew how to draw a circle, which is extremely odd.)

If you look at these Plains Indian designs, you can see that, even without any formalized geometry, they appreciated the design power of symmetry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plains_hide_painting

This lack of math at this site surprises me because my sense of it is that big, long-term laborious projects seem always (in other cases) to have been inspired by some grasp of some geometric or mathematical principle that makes the designers feel they have tapped into some big background principle that deserves monumentalizing. This site seems very emotionally motivated without any apparent intellectual statement built into it as well.

Afterthought: I guess Easter Island would be another example where the monuments have no apparent mathematical underpinnings.
 
  • #28
"This lack of math at this site surprises me because my sense of it is that big, long-term laborious projects seem always (in other cases) to have been inspired by some grasp of some geometric or mathematical principle that makes the designers feel they have tapped into some big background principle that deserves monumentalizing. This site seems very emotionally motivated without any apparent intellectual statement built into it as well.

Afterthought: I guess Easter Island would be another example where the monuments have no apparent mathematical underpinnings."

Quite possibly, as on the Easter islands, those megaliths are votive offerings on a large scale by local magnates, competing amongst themselves to gain most honour (and, "inidentally, more power) among potential followers.
 
  • #29
arildno said:
Quite possibly, as on the Easter islands, those megaliths are votive offerings on a large scale by local magnates, competing amongst themselves to gain most honour (and, "inidentally, more power) among potential followers.
Wiki just says they depict the deceased heads of lineages. Where are you getting this more in-depth understanding?
 
  • #30
zoobyshoe said:
How are they dating the things?

A bit more about that. This is the best I could find:

The archaeologists did find evidence of tool use, including stone hammers and blades. And because those artifacts closely resemble others from nearby sites previously carbon-dated to about 9000 B.C., Schmidt and co-workers estimate that Gobekli Tepe's stone structures are the same age. Limited carbon dating undertaken by Schmidt at the site confirms this assessment.

Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/gobekli-tepe.html#ixzz1o3kKUavI

This is rather ambiguous. "Evidence of tool use" is not "we found tools", is it? So if carves resemble other artifacts, is that proof of the same tools? and if so, it that proof of the same age? Or could the same type of tools be used for several thousand years?

"Limited carbon dating"? On what? That should be anything organic, but what warrants the idea that the time that such a fossil was deposited there, is equal to the building time?

"Carbon dated to about 9000 B.C."? Sounds like 11,000 before present, but if they talk about pure - uncalibrated - carbon dates then in reality we are looking at some 12900 calendar years before present, using the INTCAL09 calibration table.

All in all, it seems that the dating is not as clearly defined as it looks.
 
  • #31
zoobyshoe said:
Wiki just says they depict the deceased heads of lineages. Where are you getting this more in-depth understanding?

You may read the following article by Jared Diomand:
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/24/042.html

It is fairly uncontroversial that it was NOT the Europeans that brought upon Easter Islan its decline, it was a self-destructive cycle of status competition; self-destructive with massive deforestation on an isolated island, where the logs where used at great bonfires&banquets and as rollers for the statues.
 
  • #32
Andre said:
A bit more about that. This is the best I could find:



This is rather ambiguous. "Evidence of tool use" is not "we found tools", is it? So if carves resemble other artifacts, is that proof of the same tools? and if so, it that proof of the same age? Or could the same type of tools be used for several thousand years?

"Limited carbon dating"? On what? That should be anything organic, but what warrants the idea that the time that such a fossil was deposited there, is equal to the building time?

"Carbon dated to about 9000 B.C."? Sounds like 11,000 before present, but if they talk about pure - uncalibrated - carbon dates then in reality we are looking at some 12900 calendar years before present, using the INTCAL09 calibration table.

All in all, it seems that the dating is not as clearly defined as it looks.
After this article, they discovered that different rings had different dates, and they discovered that there had been building going on over this huge area for a couple of millenia (I believe in the last 17 years they said they have only uncovered 3% of the site. And that some of the still buried rings could test even older.

Another strange thing, the newer rings were not as well built and more crudely decorated than the older ones. Then in 8,000 BC, they decided to bury the entire site completely. IIRC, the entire site is something like 900 square meters.
 
  • #33
arildno said:
"This lack of math at this site surprises me because my sense of it is that big, long-term laborious projects seem always (in other cases) to have been inspired by some grasp of some geometric or mathematical principle that makes the designers feel they have tapped into some big background principle that deserves monumentalizing. This site seems very emotionally motivated without any apparent intellectual statement built into it as well.
Your sense seems reasonable to me.
The very big pillars in the center of the circles seem to depict arms descending from above, with a belt below with characters and symbols. By no means am I conceding anything about Gobekli Tepe before understanding far more about it.

Evo said:
After this article, they discovered that different rings had different dates, and they discovered that there had been building going on over this huge area for a couple of millenia (I believe in the last 17 years they said they have only uncovered 3% of the site. And that some of the still buried rings could test even older.

Another strange thing, the newer rings were not as well built and more crudely decorated than the older ones. Then in 8,000 BC, they decided to bury the entire site completely. IIRC, the entire site is something like 900 square meters.

I think this observation of the biggest and best being built first, if true, is instructive.

I have heard from some that the rings may have been buried progressively over the millenia, as if their individual usefulness had somehow expired, one by one.

In the audio link I posted above, hints are made of a much greater antiquity for the site than hitherto announced.

Respectfully submitted,
Steve
 
  • #34
Just a correction:
Dotini, it was zoobyshoe who made that line of reasoning you quoted, not me. I just quoted it.

My argument was primarily concerned by the possible motivations behind these monuments, rather than pin-pointing, as zoobyshoe did, some peculiar and non-trivial features about them.
 
  • #35
zoobyshoe said:
Assuming the models are more or less accurate, they show how 'un-geometric' these things were. The layout has a Hundertwasser feel to it, naive and childlike.

As a spirit site/temple, we should probably look towards its functional symbolism. What is it actually suppose to do in terms of the dead who were its "inhabitants"?

For instance, it seems likely these structures were roofed and rather womb-like. Also the later actual villages in the area are described as recreating cave-style dwellings. So there could be some conscious echo of an earlier limestone cave lifestyle - a popular paleo option.

So form follows function here most probably. Only later do we see the kind of "form dominating the design" that would indicate a society that has developed mathematical thinking.

Geometric decoration, as opposed to geometric monumentalism, is in fact very old. See - http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/geometric_signs/geometric_signs.php

But again, this would about symbolism rather than "geometry" - proto-writing rather than proto-maths.

Societies that favoured geometric decoration were also most likely responding to constraints in their materials. Such as a habit of body painting - simple patterns rather than representations making more sense when your skin is the canvas. Likewise, weaving and beading rather push the maker in the direction of simple geometric patterns.

Amusing you should mention Hundertwasser. His was the first proper exhibition I went to as a kid. Unfortunately he had very little architectural impact on NZ - the only monument he left here was his local public toilets I think!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kawakawa,_New_Zealand
 
<h2>1. What are megalith circles?</h2><p>Megalith circles are large, ancient structures made of standing stones that were constructed by humans thousands of years ago. These stones are often arranged in a circular or oval shape and can range in size from a few meters to hundreds of meters in diameter.</p><h2>2. How old are these megalith circles?</h2><p>The megalith circles discussed in this article are estimated to be around 12,000 years old, making them some of the oldest known human-made structures in the world.</p><h2>3. How were these megalith circles constructed?</h2><p>The construction methods of these megalith circles are still somewhat of a mystery. However, it is believed that the stones were moved and arranged using a combination of tools, man-power, and advanced engineering techniques.</p><h2>4. What do these megalith circles tell us about ancient humans?</h2><p>The existence of these megalith circles challenges our previous assumptions about the capabilities and knowledge of ancient humans. It suggests that they were more advanced and organized than previously thought, with the ability to plan and construct these impressive structures.</p><h2>5. How does this discovery change our understanding of human history?</h2><p>This discovery challenges the traditional narrative of human history and forces us to reconsider the timeline of human development. It also raises questions about the cultural and technological evolution of early human societies and the extent of their knowledge and capabilities.</p>

1. What are megalith circles?

Megalith circles are large, ancient structures made of standing stones that were constructed by humans thousands of years ago. These stones are often arranged in a circular or oval shape and can range in size from a few meters to hundreds of meters in diameter.

2. How old are these megalith circles?

The megalith circles discussed in this article are estimated to be around 12,000 years old, making them some of the oldest known human-made structures in the world.

3. How were these megalith circles constructed?

The construction methods of these megalith circles are still somewhat of a mystery. However, it is believed that the stones were moved and arranged using a combination of tools, man-power, and advanced engineering techniques.

4. What do these megalith circles tell us about ancient humans?

The existence of these megalith circles challenges our previous assumptions about the capabilities and knowledge of ancient humans. It suggests that they were more advanced and organized than previously thought, with the ability to plan and construct these impressive structures.

5. How does this discovery change our understanding of human history?

This discovery challenges the traditional narrative of human history and forces us to reconsider the timeline of human development. It also raises questions about the cultural and technological evolution of early human societies and the extent of their knowledge and capabilities.

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