When did people first settle at Çatalhöyük?
Let’s take a journey back 9,000 years to 7,400BCE when people first settled at Çatalhöyük. In this period, the site was situated in a wetland where the climate was moist and rainy. A wide range of resources were available including fish, water birds and their eggs.
What is the significance of Çatalhöyük?
Çatalhöyük is a large Neolithic village in Turkey; its name means "Fork Mound" The site is a huge tell—91 acres in area and nearly 70 feet tall. It was occupied between 7400–5200 BCE, and at its height, between 3,000 and 8,000 people lived there. The Quintessential Neolithic Village
How was Çatalhöyük excavated?
Çatalhöyük was excavated in the 1960s in a methodical way, but not using the full range of natural science techniques that are available to us today. Sir James Mellaart who excavated the site in the 1960s came up with all sorts of ideas about the way the site was organized and how it was lived in and so on ...
Why are there so many young people in Çatalhöyük?
The excavator of Çatalhöyük believes that this special concern for youths at the site may be a reflection of the society becoming more sedentary and required larger numbers of children because of increased labor, exchange and inheritance needs.
What is the Neolithic town Catal Huyuk famous for?
What is Çatalhöyük known for? Catal Huyuk is known for being one of the first permanent human settlements. It provides insight into how people lived many thousands of years ago.
What is catalhoyuk known for?
Çatalhöyük or Çatal Höyük (pronounced "cha-tal hay OOK") is not the oldest site of the Neolithic era or the largest, but it is extremely important to the beginning of art.
Why did people settle in catalhoyuk?
A River's Alluvial Fan Made Çatalhöyük. a Good Place to Live "In the Neolithic, this would have been quite a nice place to live. You would have had water for drinking, for washing. Animals would have been drawn to the river-ideal for hunting.
What happened to the settlement of Catal Huyuk?
Over time, houses were renewed by partial demolition and rebuilding on a foundation of rubble, which was how the mound was gradually built up. As many as eighteen levels of settlement have been uncovered. As a part of ritual life, the people of Çatalhöyük buried their dead within the village.
Who lived in Catal huyuk?
The 3000 to 8000 people that lived in Catalhoyuk at a given time were farmers and herders of cattle. They venerated bulls and worshiped a mother goddess; they produced paintings of hunting scenes and shaped object from obsidian quarried hundred of miles to the north, indicating long distance trade.
What was life like in Catal huyuk?
In Catal Huyuk, there were no panes of glass in windows and houses did not have chimneys. Inside houses were plastered and often had painted murals of people and animals on the walls. People slept on platforms. In Catal Huyuk the dead were buried inside houses.
How old is the first settlement at Çatalhöyük?
about 9,500 years agoBy the time Catalhoyuk was first settled—about 9,500 years ago, according to a recent round of radiocarbon dating at the site—the Neolithic epoch was well under way. The residents of this huge village cultivated wheat and barley, as well as lentils, peas, bitter vetch and other legumes. They herded sheep and goats.
When was Çatal Hüyük settled?
October 29, 1923Çatalhöyük / Date settled
How was Çatalhöyük founded?
Founded over 9,000 years ago on the bank of a river that has since dried up, Çatalhöyük is believed to have been home to an egalitarian Stone Age society who built distinctive homes, arranged back-to-back without doors or windows. They went in and out through openings in the roof.
How would you describe Çatalhöyük?
What does Çatalhöyük mean? Çatalhöyük means 'forked mound' and refers to the site's east and west mounds, which formed as centuries of townspeople tore down and rebuilt the settlement's mud-brick houses. No one knows what the townspeople called their home 9,000 years ago.
Where is the oldest known Neolithic settlement?
Mesopotamia is the site of the earliest developments of the Neolithic Revolution from around 10,000 BC. Early Neolithic farming was limited to a narrow range of plants, both wild and domesticated, which included einkorn wheat, millet and spelt, and the keeping of dogs.
How would you describe Çatalhöyük?
What does Çatalhöyük mean? Çatalhöyük means 'forked mound' and refers to the site's east and west mounds, which formed as centuries of townspeople tore down and rebuilt the settlement's mud-brick houses. No one knows what the townspeople called their home 9,000 years ago.
Is Çatalhöyük the first city?
Well, at the moment, Çatalhöyük is the first known city in the world – the first place where surrounding villages came together and formed a central location and began the sort of urban civilization that dominates the modern world.
Where did the Neolithic people live?
Around 7,400 BCE, people first settled in Central Turkey at the site of Çatalhöyük. By 6,500 BCE, the site was a Neolithic urban center. Several construction phases of tightly packed mud brick houses led to the formation of a tall mound at the site. The excavation of the mound and the examination of discovered features and artifacts led to the understanding of what life was like in the Neolithic community and how it developed over time. The site provides great insight into how early farming communities functioned and what activities and items they valued.
What was the most abundant form of art found at the site of the ruins of the ruins?
One of the most abundant forms of art found at the site was clay figurines. They were found throughout various areas of the houses, but usually in garbage pits.
What did the art, organization of houses, and presence of agriculture suggest?
The art, organization of houses, and presence of agriculture suggests that the residents of the Çatalhöyük site were in a position in which they could stay in one spot and hold territory. They had stable enough resources to devote time to the arts, but used paintings and installations to connect them to the memories of the past way of life. Çatalhöyük was one of the largest settlements of its time, and by examining the ancient structures and artifacts we can gain insight into how humans lived during the beginning stages of farming and crop cultivation.
How many people lived in the mud brick houses in the mud bricks?
It was not a large enough settlement to be considered a chiefdom or state, but still had up to 9,000 residents. Inside the mud brick houses, there were cooking spaces with ovens and hearths. As agriculture was beginning to become the dominant way of life, food preparation was developing.
How is the name "Catalhoyuk" pronounced?
Its name means "fork mound" in Turkish, and it is spelled in a variety of ways, including Catalhoyuk, Catal Huyuk, Catal Hoyuk: all of them are pronounced rough ly Chattle-HowYUK.
What are the mounds in the ruins of the ruins of the ruins?
The two mounds are made up of den sely clustered groups of mudbrick buildings arranged around open unroofed open courtyard areas , perhaps shared or midden areas. Most of the structures were clustered into room blocks, with walls built so closely together they melted into one another. At the end of their use-life, the rooms were generally demolished, and a new room built in its place, almost always with the same internal layout as its predecessor.
What are the two groups of buildings that Mellaart classed as?
Mellaart classed the buildings into two groups: residential structures and shrines, using internal decoration as an indicator of a given room's religious importance. Hodder had another idea: he defines the special buildings as History Houses.
When did Mellaart work at the East Mound?
Mellaart conducted four seasons between 1961–1965 and only excavated about 4 percent of the site, concentrated on the southwest side of the East Mound: his exacting excavation strategy and copious notes are remarkable for the period. Hodder began work at the site in 1993 and still continues to this day: his Çatalhöyük Research Project is a multinational and multidisciplinary project with many innovative components.
What is non-portable sculpture?
The non-portable sculpture is associated with the benches/burials. Those consist of protruding molded plaster features, some of which are plain and circular (Mellaart called them breasts) and others are stylized animal heads with inset auroch, or goat/sheep horns. These are molded or set onto the wall or mounted onto the benches or at the edges of platforms; they typically were re-plastered several times, perhaps when deaths occurred.
Who were the two main excavators of the Mounds?
Excavations at the mounds represent one of the most extensive and detailed work at any Neolithic village in the world, largely because of the two main excavators, James Mellaart (1925–2012) and Ian Hodder (born 1948). Both men were detail-conscious and exacting archaeologists, far ahead of their respective times in the history of the science.
Who discovered copper smelting?
Excavator James Mellaart believed he had identified evidence for copper smelting at Çatalhöyük, 1,500 years earlier than the next known evidence. Metal minerals and pigments were found throughout Çatalhöyük, including powdered azurite, malachite, red ochre, and cinnabar, often associated with the internal burials.
What is the most significant human settlement in Turkey?
Fork ( çatal in Turkish) and mound ( höyük) combine to form Çatalhöyük. Today the site is regarded by UNESCO as the most significant human settlement documenting early settled agricultural life. (See also: Face of a 9,500-year-old man revealed for the first time .)
Where did people live during the Stone Age?
Beginning in the 1960s, work at Çatalhöyük (in central Turkey) has unearthed numerous levels of close-knit households where a large community of people lived during the Stone Age as humanity began to reject nomadic life. The Konya Plain stretches for hundreds of miles across central Turkey. Almost 60 years ago, in a remote spot some 30 miles ...
Where did the Stone Age start?
This Stone Age settlement took humanity's first steps toward city life. Settled more than 9,000 years ago in Turkey, Çatalhöyük focused on farming with the seeds of urban living planted at its heart. Beginning in the 1960s, work at Çatalhöyük (in central Turkey) has unearthed numerous levels of close-knit households where a large community ...
Where is the Konya Plain?
The Konya Plain stretches for hundreds of miles across central Turkey. Almost 60 years ago, in a remote spot some 30 miles from the regional capital of Konya, a team of archaeologists began exploring two small hills.
Who illustrated the reconstruction of the settlement in its wider landscape?
Reconstruction of the settlement in its wider landscape. Illustrated by John Swogger.
What was the East Mound used for?
One of these was the West Mound. Interestingly over the millennia, surrounding communities continued to use the East Mound for burial and other activities. Clearly this remained a special place in the landscape.
Who illustrated the East Mound?
Illustration depicting the East Mound. Illustrated by Kathryn Killackey.
The Quintessential Neolithic Village
Chronology of The Site
- Çatalhöyük's two tells—the East and West Mounds—include an area of about 91 acres (37 hectares), located on either side of a relict channel of the Çarsamba River, about 3,280 feet (1,000 meters) above mean sea level. The region is semi-arid today, as it was in the past, and largely treeless except near the rivers. The East Mound is the largest and oldest of the two, its rough ov…
Houses and Site Organization
- The two mounds are made up of densely clustered groups of mudbrick buildings arranged around open unroofed open courtyard areas, perhaps shared or midden areas. Most of the structures were clustered into room blocks, with walls built so closely together they melted into one another. At the end of their use-life, the rooms were generally demolished, and a new room built in its pla…
Living Space
- The main living spaces at Çatalhöyük were rarely larger than 275 sq ft (25 sq m and they were occasionally broken into smaller regions of 10–16 sq ft (1–1.5 sq m). They included ovens, hearths, and pits, raised floors, platforms, and benches. The benches and platforms were generally on the eastern and northern walls of the rooms, and they generally...
History Houses
- Mellaart classed the buildings into two groups: residential structures and shrines, using internal decoration as an indicator of a given room's religious importance. Hodder had another idea: he defines the special buildings as History Houses. History Houses are those were reused again and again rather than rebuilt, some for centuries, and also included decorations. Decorations are fou…
Art Work
- Both portable and non-portable art was found at Çatalhöyük. The non-portable sculpture is associated with the benches/burials. Those consist of protruding molded plaster features, some of which are plain and circular (Mellaart called them breasts) and others are stylized animal heads with inset auroch, or goat/sheep horns. These are molded or set onto the wall or mounted onto t…
Plants, Animals, and Environment
- The earliest phase of occupation in the East Mound happened when the local environment was in the process of changing from humid to dryland conditions. There is evidence that the climate changedconsiderably during the length of the occupation, including drought periods. The move to the West Mound occurred when there appeared a localized wetter area southeast of the new sit…