SEV Connect - Kış 2019

CONNECT KIŞ 5 the left parietal, the position of which was carefully chosen so that the skull might hang vertically and face forward, looking at the gods, when suspended. Drilled perforation at the top of the cranium is used to suspend the skull with a cord. Carvings were used for stabilization purposes, preventing the cord from slipping. One of the 3 skulls found belonged to an individual, 25 to 40 years of age, who was more likely female than male. These pieces of evidence have culminated in the interpretation of Göbeklitepe as a sacrificial ritual center of early hunter-gatherer groups living around Southeast Anatolia. The people who gathered at these temples were not permanently living in that area and they wanted the temples to stay safe until their next visit. It has been discovered that these temples were hidden by the builders under soil, to protect them until the next sacrificial ceremony – maybe till the next harvest season! According to a recent study the ancestors of the people who built Stonehenge traveled west across the Mediterranean before reaching Britain. Researchers in London compared DNA extracted fromNeolithic human remains found in Britain with that of people alive at the same time in Europe. The Neolithic inhabitants appear to have traveled fromAnatolia (modern Turkey) to Iberia before winding their way north. Maybe the recently discovered Dolmen de Guadalperal ( so called the Spanish Stonehenge) at the Valdecanas Reservoir in Spain – which is also believed to be a place where religious rituals were performed – is another example that had been created by the people that traveled fromGöbeklitepe to Stonehenge. They reached Britain in about 4,000 BC. Pieces of human bones in soil from niches behind the stone pillars at the site, like those discovered in Göbeklitepe, and the vast amount of animal bone discovered at the site, suggest that ritual sacrifice regularly took place here. There is perhaps a parallel here with the much later site at DurringtonWalls, close to Stonehenge, inWiltshire, England. Dating to around 2,600 BC, Durrington Walls was a huge ritual timber circle where enormous amounts of animal bone, primarily from pigs and cattle, were discovered. So, maybe all these temples were the sites of sacrifices to please the gods and seek their permission… and this was how mankind was trying to move from ‘hunting and gathering’ to ‘farming and production’. Skulls with markings found at Göbeklitepe suggest rituals. (Science Magazine / YouTube) Building D pillar. Image of the ‘Gift Bearer’ at Göbeklitepe. (Image: German Archaelogical Institute – DAI / Author Provided) A model of the Göbeklitepe excavation area exhibited in the Neolithic hall of the Şanlıurfa Museum. ( CC BY-SA 4.0 )