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

AI Thread Summary
The discovery of Gobekli Tepe, a site in southeastern Turkey, has revealed massive carved stones that are approximately 12,000 years old, predating Stonehenge by 6,000 years. This find challenges previous beliefs about early human societies, as it suggests that sophisticated construction and potential religious practices existed among hunter-gatherers before the advent of agriculture and metal tools. Archaeologists, led by Klaus Schmidt, believe the site may be the world's oldest temple, previously misidentified as a medieval cemetery. The carvings were likely made using flint tools on soft limestone, indicating advanced skills in stoneworking. This groundbreaking discovery raises numerous questions about the cultural practices and capabilities of prehistoric peoples.
Evo
Staff Emeritus
Messages
24,029
Reaction score
3,323
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

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
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Science news on Phys.org
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.
 
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.
 
Last edited:
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.
 
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.
 
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.
 
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).
 
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).
 
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

for some context
http://www.cas.umt.edu/anthropology/courses/anth254/
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #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.
 
Last edited:
  • #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.
 
Last edited:
  • #27
Evo said:
Zooby, all I could find was this short video.

http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/the-magazine/the-magazine-latest/ngm-gobekli-tepe-artwork/
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
 
  • #36
Andre said:
All in all, it seems that the dating is not as clearly defined as it looks.
It seems to me this is the case. Every aspect of it could probably be reasonably questioned.
 
  • #37
arildno said:
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.
The comparison of the heads to Egyptian pyramids as status symbols probably holds water. Were you suggesting the circles in Turkey might have had a similar function?
 
  • #38
apeiron said:
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.
It makes sense that geometric designs would be arrived at incidental to the process of weaving. They are carried over, though, onto non-woven artifacts like painted designs and pottery glazes and wood carvings, due, I would say, to their inherent visual power (which is probably due to the fact of Kluver Form Constants). As you say, this isn't math or Geometry. And, generally, this kind of non-geometric geometric design is only applied in cases where it doesn't take that long to make.

Huge projects, like stonehenge and the pyramids, that involve years of work and large numbers of workers, seem to require that the designers and political "muscle" driving them to completion, be inspired by understanding of a deeper math behind them. This site under discussion seems to defy that to me. All this stone work must have taken a very long time and involved a lot of people without any of them seeming to even realize you can generate a perfect circle with a stake and a piece of rope. So, you have to wonder what was inspiring them to work so hard on something that wasn't going to be "perfect" in a higher sense.

The kind of "spirit" site you mention strikes me as something that would only be set up temporarily for a dedicated rite, a healing, rain dance, vision quest, etc. If they always returned the same "spirit" site for a given ritual over centuries, though, it would make sense that at some point after they acquired stone carving skills they would decide to set up permanent structures and that these would naturally be installed in the original informal layout.
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
Which leads me to the not-very-serious suggestion these things could have been elaborate public toilet facilities for all we know.
 
  • #39
zoobyshoe said:
The comparison of the heads to Egyptian pyramids as status symbols probably holds water. Were you suggesting the circles in Turkey might have had a similar function?
Yes.
Nor is it unlikely, considering what is well attested in other cultures.
The concept "conspicuous consumption" is well established within anthropology in that a primary manner in which local magnates rule is NOT through terror&violence, but by proving their worth to the community through spectacular feasting, temple building, organizing great gladiatorial displays etc. (It is these "gifts" that in a way "justify" them in also, when they feel the need, to maintain their power through..terror&violence)

Furthermore, the concept of conspicuous consumption is, in MY view, probably related to the biological principle underlying, for example, the male pheasant's ridiculous tail:
It is only the very strongest males, in genetic terms, that can survive with such a anti-adaptive tail (considered relative to factors like flight capability, being able to hide from predators etc), and THUS, the females will pick these as their favourites.

A not incidental side effect of the system of conspicuous consumption is that it effectively bars wannabe magnates from becoming actual magnates.

Who would you follow?
The one who can invite you to great banquets, or the one who can't afford to organize such in the first place?
 
Last edited:
  • #40
zoobyshoe said:
It seems to me this is the case. Every aspect of it could probably be reasonably questioned.
The article Andre referenced was from 2008, the oldest parts of the site that they have uncovered are now believed to be over 12,000 years old.

But the plants and bones they tested might have been backfill thousands of years after the structure was built, so yes, it is highly likely that the actual structures are much older than thought.
 
Last edited:
  • #41
Last edited by a moderator:
  • #42
arildno said:
Yes.
Nor is it unlikely, considering what is well attested in other cultures.
The concept "conspicuous consumption" is well established within anthropology in that a primary manner in which local magnates rule is NOT through terror&violence, but by proving their worth to the community through spectacular feasting, temple building, organizing great gladiatorial displays etc. (It is these "gifts" that in a way "justify" them in also, when they feel the need, to maintain their power through..terror&violence)

Furthermore, the concept of conspicuous consumption is, in MY view, probably related to the biological principle underlying, for example, the male pheasant's ridiculous tail:
It is only the very strongest males, in genetic terms, that can survive with such a anti-adaptive tail (considered relative to factors like flight capability, being able to hide from predators etc), and THUS, the females will pick these as their favourites.

A not incidental side effect of the system of conspicuous consumption is that it effectively bars wannabe magnates from becoming actual magnates.

Who would you follow?
The one who can invite you to great banquets, or the one who can't afford to organize such in the first place?
This all makes perfect sense. Rather than religious sites these things might have been essentially political.

But, rather than a whole monument being about one "magnate" the various animals each might symbolize a clan, tribe, or clan/tribe leader/magnate, who had entered into a pact of some sort with all the others. As time went on and old leaders died off, the political climate could have dramatically shifted. The past would be, quite literally, buried and a new picture of the new political structure would have to be created nearby.

On the other hand, they could all each be about one magnate. If we say a given 'circle' represents a given prehistoric 'Caesar', the various different animal slabs might represent the various foreign peoples he had subjugated under the central government. Here, too, the political situation would have to be revised over time as successive 'Caesars' won or lost dominion.

I think there's a lot of realistic non-religious purposes these things could have been created to serve. Religion would naturally be the matrix in which it was all set, but only in the sense most governments have historically been set in a religious matrix.
 
  • #43
Evo said:
The article Andre referenced was from 2008, the oldest parts of the site that they have uncovered are now believed to be over 12,000 years old.

But the plants and bones they tested might have been backfill thousands of years after the structure was built, so yes, it is highly likely that the actual structures are much older than thought.
The dirt used to fill in might be much older than the monument, though. If they took the fill dirt from layers of ancient middens, the organic matter in that dirt would be much older than the monument it buried. Carbon dating of charcoal that seems to come from the layer right on top of which the pillars were first erected would be the most reliable, I'd think.
 
  • #44
zoobyshoe said:
This all makes perfect sense. Rather than religious sites these things might have been essentially political.
That separation is just meaningless for just about any other culture than the judeo-Christian.
Rather, those sites are AS MUCH religious as they are political. There is no reason, to think, that the magnates were snickering atheists out to awe the dumb religionists. Furthermore, to curry favour from the gods by creating temples clearly has the premise that you believe in the gods to begin with. Even though you hope the gods will favour you with political success.
But, rather than a whole monument being about one "magnate" the various animals each might symbolize a clan, tribe, or clan/tribe leader/magnate, who had entered into a pact of some sort with all the others. As time went on and old leaders died off, the political climate could have dramatically shifted. The past would be, quite literally, buried and a new picture of the new political structure would have to be created nearby.

On the other hand, they could all each be about one magnate. If we say a given 'circle' represents a given prehistoric 'Caesar', the various different animal slabs might represent the various foreign peoples he had subjugated under the central government. Here, too, the political situation would have to be revised over time as successive 'Caesars' won or lost dominion.

I think there's a lot of realistic non-religious purposes these things could have been created to serve. Religion would naturally be the matrix in which it was all set, but only in the sense most governments have historically been set in a religious matrix.

Sure, these are a number of hypotheses that are highly interesting; we might even be able with more knowledge make some of them more likely to be true than others.
 
  • #45
Dotini said:
There may be a bit of archeoastronomy going on in this one:
http://www.seshat.ch/home/goebekli.GIF
This is interesting. I was wondering if sighting along the tops of the pillars pointed to any astronomical events. I'm not sure what this diagram shows though. Some sort of moon calendar?
 
  • #46
arildno said:
Sure, these are a number of hypotheses that are highly interesting; we might even be able with more knowledge make some of them more likely to be true than others.

Since we may be able to put Gobekli Tepe in the context of Kilisik, Navali and Catal Huyuk, it occurs to me that what we may have is a sort of Neolithic University. Founded by a powerful and persuasive elite, knowledgeable from earlier experiments in proto-agriculture, a center of initiation and learning is established from which graduating classes may be sent to establish flourishing cultures throughout Anatolia, Mesopotamia, the Levant and beyond. Each class builds its ring, and fills it in after training is accomplished?

Respectfully submitted,
Steve
 
  • #47
zoobyshoe said:
The dirt used to fill in might be much older than the monument, though. If they took the fill dirt from layers of ancient middens, the organic matter in that dirt would be much older than the monument it buried. Carbon dating of charcoal that seems to come from the layer right on top of which the pillars were first erected would be the most reliable, I'd think.
It's hard to say, but they did find piles of animal bones that show signs of having been butchered by humans. I would assume that the piles of bones would not have been from piles of dirt moved there. They have also done testing on the pillars, but the tests only show when they were buried. Carbonate layers only begin to form after the burial.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/gea.20134/abstract
 
  • #48
arildno said:
That separation is just meaningless for just about any other culture than the judeo-Christian.
Rather, those sites are AS MUCH religious as they are political. There is no reason, to think, that the magnates were snickering atheists out to awe the dumb religionists. Furthermore, to curry favour from the gods by creating temples clearly has the premise that you believe in the gods to begin with. Even though you hope the gods will favour you with political success.
The distinction arises from your concept of the magnate, though. If only a magnate can afford to commission a temple and the point is to conspicuously consume to create the aura of power and wealth, the conclusion that it is essentially a political, rather than religious, gesture is obvious. That's a completely different motivation than propitiating the spirits of the dead because they'll haunt you if you don't, sort of thing.
Sure, these are a number of hypotheses that are highly interesting; we might even be able with more knowledge make some of them more likely to be true than others.
There's quite a bit more to dig up as Evo pointed out, so there's no telling what interesting clues are still hidden.
 
  • #49
Dotini said:
Since we may be able to put Gobekli Tepe in the context of Kilisik, Navali and Catal Huyuk, it occurs to me that what we may have is a sort of Neolithic University. Founded by a powerful and persuasive elite, knowledgeable from earlier experiments in proto-agriculture, a center of initiation and learning is established from which graduating classes may be sent to establish flourishing cultures throughout Anatolia, Mesopotamia, the Levant and beyond. Each class builds its ring, and fills it in after training is accomplished?

Respectfully submitted,
Steve
Something like this occurred to me after reading one of your earlier posts.

The Lakota were a huge nation and very spread out. They used to have an annual gathering to touch base and reinforce the fact they were all the same.

This site could be where something similar took place, where far flung but related bands gathered periodically to teach the young their common mythology. It would explain all the animal bone fragments in the dirt everywhere if it turned out to be the site of a huge annual picnic/reunion place.
 
  • #50
zoobyshoe said:
The distinction arises from your concept of the magnate, though. If only a magnate can afford to commission a temple and the point is to conspicuously consume to create the aura of power and wealth, the conclusion that it is essentially a political, rather than religious, gesture is obvious. That's a completely different motivation than propitiating the spirits of the dead because they'll haunt you if you don't, sort of thing.
Not really, because what you base it on is a very narrow conception of how people regard the spirit world from interacting with the real world, and how "secular" power is considered as proofs of "sparks of divinity" in those individuals fortunate to have it.
For example, the hero cults in Hellenistic Greece and the imperial cults in Rome are highly interesting in these respects.
The historian Price has written an excellent, and still considered seminal, study on the Roman Imperial Cult in Asia minor, "Rituals and Power: The Roman Imperial Cult in Asia Minor "
This book has university academic standard, and was used in my stint at studying history at oslo University.
Here's the Amazon link:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/052131268X/?tag=pfamazon01-20

My main point of contention though, are what WORDS are appropriate in history, and which we should not use.
The couple "essential/inessential" is basically either rhetorically pointing at som "eternal essence" (and I do NOT think you intended that), OR, as a quantifying measure of relative weights.
But, quantification of the importance of different causes in history is highly suspect, or must be used with extreme caution, and we need a more modest idea besides:
To which extent our sources seem to indicate that analytically separate ideas were intertwined in some particular culture, or equivalently, how "separate" those ideas where.

(Judeo-)Christianity is quite unique in this degree of separatedness of the sacred and the secular, the normal picture seems to indicate a much stronger degree of intertwining.BTW, Price* is quite adept in showing that in terms of quantification, LOCAL status competition for construction of imperial cults was probably more important than heavy-handed, centrally directed adoration policy from the Roman State.
It was the LOCAL magnates, in scurrying not just for (or even mainly for) imperial favour, but in order to be resplendent in the eyes of the local population by having a "closer tie" with the almost-divine, far-off Emperor through his temple construction in his honour..
More than enough sources indicate that the Emperors themselves were rather embarassed on the personal level at the prevalence of this religio-political "Greek" phenomenon, closely related to the city-state structure of Asia Minor.*Whose main laudable effort in that work is to "de-Christianize" religion as such, in particular opposing the traditional view that worship of a living, or dead, person, was some sort of "debasement" of religion for "mere political" reasons. Rather, the mentality landscape, Price argues, between religious might and secular power should NOT be regarded in such a way that the clear distinction between "religion" and "politics" is to be assumed to have been felt as "natural" as it is for cultural Christians.
 
Last edited:

Hot Threads

Recent Insights

Back
Top