Yorkshirepedestrian
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12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 20, 2008, 11:46
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I guess most of you are already aware of this, but I find it mindblowing that such a sophisticated megalithic culture existed while they were in their hunter-gatherer state. Why are we sill told the first civilisations began 5,000 years ago? I'd bloody love to see some images of the animal carvings on these stones and the temple as a whole!
http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav041708a.shtml
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fitzcoraldo
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 20, 2008, 12:06
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Howdo YP
If you do a google image search for gobekli Tepe you'll find some nice images on foriegn websites including this one http://www.geocities.com/izkir/gobeklitepe.html
I'd recommend Steven Mithen's book, After the Ice, for a good overview of prehistory 20000-5000BC
cheers
fitz
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Jane
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 20, 2008, 12:51
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fitzcoraldo wrote: Steven Mithen's book, After the Ice
I agree! It's a gem and puts everything in context.
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Yorkshirepedestrian
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 20, 2008, 14:50
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Sounds awesome.. I'll put that in my next Amazon package.
Interesting pictures too. The stones seem completely covered beyond head height. They seem so finely worked too, for such a remote period.
I remember some of this being covered in an excellent series on Stone Age civilisation.. by a guy who also did a more recent series on pagan ritual. The images of a 10,000 year old Turkish city stuck with me, and reminded me of a Holdstock novel, Ancient Echoes.
It makes me wonder what discoveries may await us here. Those enigmatic post holes in the Stonehenge car park always set my imagination running.
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dodge one
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 21, 2008, 17:17
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A truly extroadinary discovery. I'm guessing it will take a long time for the history text books to 'catch-up'. Last time i studied the cradle of civilization, it was still Mohenjo-daro!
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dodge one
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 21, 2008, 20:39
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An interesting interview:http://www.andrewcollins.com/page/articles/Gobekli_Tepe_interview.htm This site has me utterly fascinated at the moment. The carved images represent many mythologies and biblical imagaries. They bring to my mind a prehistoric zodiac of sorts. Will be following futher developements at this site avidly!
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handofdave
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 21, 2008, 23:38
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Is it any wonder if there were bright spots of creativity in the prehistoric world? I think the majority opinion of human capabilities as it's been generally accepted is an artifice. There's a catfight always going on in the world of paleontology. Theories are reputations, and are defended fiercely. But so few are willing to admit that the spread of stone-shaping* humans across the planet could have taken many routes, not just those that fit the strictures of an academically competitive argument.
*How many human cultures from before recorded time existed? There could have been millenia where humans left no lasting traces of technological history... wood and plant based societies would be erased completely from the timeline within a matter of decades...
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moss
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 23, 2008, 09:58
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If you buy the Guardian today, there is a lovely photo of the stone with birds and scorpion....
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Yorkshirepedestrian
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 25, 2008, 01:52
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There does seem to be a hardcore of "ologists" who could be accused of burying their heads in the sand in the face of enigmas which hint at "lost civilisations".
There was that business with the Sphinx's heavy weathering by water. Then there's the great pyramids themselves (they really do challenge the scientists, hehe). THeir sheer mass, all aligned perfectly to the cardinal points. We couldn't do that today! yet Egypt acquired the ability to do so from being stone age hunters in a matter of a hundred years.
And there are those large structures discovered recently beneath the sea off Japan and India.
Does anyone remember that fellow, Graham Hancock? He used to look into this but went all shamanic on us a few years ago and started hanging out in rainforests, tripping on ayahuasca.. heh.
Heard him speak coupla years ago on Coast to Coast and sounds like he's had some interesting experiences out there in the wild forever.
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Yorkshirepedestrian
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Re: 12,000 year old temple in Turkey
Apr 25, 2008, 02:06
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This place is so important.
There are hopefully some huge insights to come about how it all began.
One paragraph from my original link that just struck me...
[
Look at this", he says, pointing at a photo of an exquisitely carved sculpture showing an animal, half-human, half-lion. "It’s a sphinx, thousands of years before Egypt. Southeastern Turkey, northern Syria - this region saw the wedding night of our civilization."
]
I remember a geologist, Robert Schoch I think, was convinced the Sphinx was heavily weathered by water which could make it at least 10,000 years old.. so what if this carving in Turkey wasn't thousands of years before the Sphinx?
It'd be nice to think this could all link up and point towards a lost stone age culture.
Interesting what you said about the zodiac too, as the Sphinx looks exactly towards the constellation of Leo as it rose on the winter equinox in... 10,000 BCE.
I dunno.
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