The massive limestone monoliths weigh between ten and twenty tons and are weirdly carved with fantastic scorpions, lions, spiders and snakes that testify to the difficult hunter’s life. Unearthed after thousands of years of deliberate forgetfulness, these silent pillars stand in a circle located only a few miles south of the ancient town of Sanliurfa, Turkey, the supposed birthplace of the prophet Abraham.
Gobekli Tepe may have been accidentally rediscovered by a shepherd, but it’s provenance is no mistake. Carbon dating has estimated the site to have been built in approximately 12,000 B.C., turning prior theories about our Neolithic hunter/gatherer past upside down.
Archeology Magazine reports that before the discovery of Gobekli Tepe, experts believed that societies in the early Neolithic were organized into small bands of hunter-gatherers and that the first complex religious practices were developed by groups that had already mastered agriculture. Scholars thought that the earliest monumental architecture was possible only after agriculture provided Neolithic people with food surpluses, freeing them from a constant focus on day-to-day survival. A site of unbelievable artistry and intricate detail, Gobekli Tepe has turned this theory on its head.*
In other words, Gobekli Tepe was built before the invention of pottery, Sumerian writing tablets, the wheel, Stonehenge and the Pyramids at Giza.
Building such a site is an engineering challenge perhaps greater than the Egyptian pyramids. At least 500 people would be needed to shift these immense pillars from the limestone quarries to the temple site, all without the luxury of rollers. It’s an administrative task requiring operational and organizational skills – not something readily believable of people still running around with clubs and communicating by grunts.
And why here?
Scanning the immediate valley area 1,000 feet below reveals an arid climate. Summer temperatures can easily soar to over 115 degrees Fahrenheit while winters enjoy rainy deluges. However, when speaking with Smithsonian magazine, Klaus Schmidt, an archeologist at the German Archeological Institute in Istanbul, observed:
“Imagine what the landscape would have looked like 11,000 years ago, before centuries of intensive farming and settlement turned it into the nearly featureless brown expanse it is today. Prehistoric people would have gazed upon herds of gazelle and other wild animals; gently flowing rivers, which attracted migrating geese and ducks; fruit and nut trees; and rippling fields of wild barley and wild wheat varieties such as emmer and einkorn. This area was like a paradise." **
A paradise indeed.
Gobekli Tepe is located at the far end of what was once known as the Fertile Crescent, the cradle of ancient agriculture. The world's first farmyard pigs were domesticated at Cayonu, just 60 miles away. Sheep, cattle and goats were also first domesticated in eastern Turkey. Worldwide wheat species descend from einkorn wheat - first cultivated on the hills near Gobekli. Other domestic cereals - such as rye and oats - also started here.***
And according to Schmidt, it was a paradise that was lost.
Farming changes the landscape. Trees are cut down, constant plowing leaches away valuable minerals and rivers are dammed, drying up the filtering swamps. Eventually, the soil became overstressed and crop returns were diminished.
The once lush climate became the dry, hilly plain now seen today.
And what of the temple silently standing watch over the plains?
Around 8,000 B.C., for some unknown reason, worshippers buried Gobekli Tepe under tons of earth, deliberately wiping out its existence until a Kurdish shepherd spotted a monolith’s edge peeking out of the ground.
For a majestic visual of the breathtaking structure and other figurines found on site, check out this 6-minute YouTube video. (Watch for the crocodile-like carving at the one minute, 30 second mark).
Reference Sources:
*Scham, Sandra. The World’s First Temple. Archeology Magazine, November/December, 2008.
**Curry, Andrew. Göbekli Tepe: The World’s First Temple? Smithsonian.com, November, 2008
***Knox, Tom. Do these mysterious stones mark the site of the Garden of Eden? Daily Mail Online, March 5, 2009
Other Sources:
Wikipedia: Göbekli Tepe
Archeology News: Reliefs Unearthed in 11,000 year old Göbekli Tepe tumulus
Comments
totally awesome culture. very nice video.
it looks that the culture was way more advance than it was assume they were. the work is exquisite.
"people still running around with clubs and communicating by grunts"
At around 12000 bc people were like us, fully articulated. As for running around with clubs, the monuments are proof that people formed a very organize society, where some people were producing food, clothes, ect, while others were building temples.
Nice video - but why is the animal at 1:30 called a crocodile? It has visible ears. I've never seen a crocodile with pointy ears. And neither had humans 9,000 years ago.
this just shows that so much is unknown 'bout humanity's past...
Yes, this is what should be known as a history-altering discovery. Not near enough recognition yet my the mainstream press. Stupendous is the word. Thanks for the article.
However, I find this statement to be rather curious, and positively incorrect: "these silent pillars stand in a circle located only a few miles south of the ancient town of Sanliurfa, Turkey, the legendary birthplace of the prophet Abraham."
First of all, it should be "mythical" not "legendary", and NO, the mythical Abraham (a Bramha, with his consort goddess Saraisvati, the source of the mythical "Abraham" of the Chaldeans and his "sister/wife" Sarai)were a myth originating in Ur, quite close to present day Baghdad, not "Sanliurfa." Chaldea being a region of India, near a river called "Haggar", which should ring mythical bells.
Indeed, a quick search shows a statuette from Ur, from the period Abraham supposedly lived in, of a Ram caught in a thicket. Sound at all "familiar?"
Quite an "unusual" error ther
For more details, see the journal article "Animals in the symbolic world or Pre-Pottery Neolithic Gobekli Tepe, south-eastern Turkey: a preliminary assessment" by Joris Peters and Klaus Schmidt in Anthropozoologica 2004, vol. 39 (1): 179-218. It's available free of charge online. I believe your "croc" is a fox.
Due to the ancient name of the town of Urfa (Urhoy/Urhay), and to the fact that the area was anciently Aramean, so the Aramaic language was native there, many Syriac Arameans and Assyrians believe that Abraham was born in Urfa/Urhoy.
Also, since Ur in southern Mesopotamia had been forgotten for centuries, there was no other strong candidate for 'Ur of the Chaldess' from the time of Alexander until the 19th century.
Most scholars claim that the reference to Ur of the Chaldeans is a reference to the ancient Sumerian city of Ur in southern Iraq . The land called Mat Kaldi, or Chaldea, was in southern Iraq , and maybe as far west as Kuwait . At the time when Abraham might have been born according to some traditions, the city had become perhaps the largest city of its time, with roughly 65,000 inhabitants, though in about 1950 BCE, Ur fell to the Elamites. Rebuilding of Ur took place under Nebuchadnezzar, at about the time of the Babylonian Captivity (the removal of much of the Jewish people to Babylon ). Nebuchadnezzar was of Chaldean ancestry, so from the late 7th century BCE through the end of the 6th century BCE the term ‘Ur of the Chaldees’ would have been understood to refer to the Sumerian city of Ur. Ur however became uninhabited by the beginning of the 5th century BCE.
Chaldea was never part of India . Both Chaldea and western India (now Pakistan ) were part of both the Achaemenid Persian Empire and the Seleucid Empire.
The names Abraham and Sarah (princess?) are modifications of the names Abram (Father was exalted) and Sarai. Although the account of Abraham in Genesis shows him coming from southern Mesopotamia ( Ur of the Chaldees), the family connections are with Arameans at Harran, near Urfa . The voyages of Isaac and Jacob to Harran for wives underscore this, as does the Aramaic ‘Yegar Sahadutha’ (Heap Witness) in Genesis 31:47.
Be Well,
Bob Griffin
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