Çatal Hüyük is a very old city . It was built by Neolithic people in southern Anatolia (present-day Turkey) about 8,000 years ago and it was kept there for more than 800 years, approximately between the years 6250 and 5400 BC. Excavations, begun in the 1960s, have shown that much of the city is still preserved.
The first builders of Çatal Hüyük were nomadic hunters who had started farming . To do so they needed to live in a fixed location. The first houses they built were made of wood and sun-dried mud bricks. Those houses did not last long and, as they fell down, others were built on top of them. Over the centuries, the layers gradually increased until they formed a gigantic mound of earth.
The Çatal Hüyük site covers an area of 13 hectares and consists of two mounds (hüyük means earth mound containing ancient remains ). In the early 1960s, a team of British archaeologists, led by James Mellaart , began to excavate the great mound of Çatal Este and inside it they found a Neolithic city. It consisted of a maze of one-room houses, all built wall to wall, with no streets in between. The houses were made of wood, adobe and plaster, with flat roofs. Each house had a single large room, usually about twenty feet by four feet, with one or two small storerooms. The main room had platforms for sitting and sleeping, as well as an oven for cooking. At the top of the walls, small windows were opened that let in a small amount of natural light.
Land cultivation in Çatal Hüyük
Most of the inhabitants of Çatal Hüyük worked as farmers, irrigating the fields around the city through canals they had dug. They grew barley, wheat, peas and lentils , in addition to raising domesticated animals, such as pigs, sheep and goats. In the surrounding area they collected, among others, nuts and fruits, apples, almonds and pistachios.
At its maximum size, Çatal Hüyük had between 5,000 and 6,000 inhabitants. The city was large enough to be able to support with its surpluses some people who did not cultivate the land, but worked as artisans or merchants. This new social group became richer than the rest and began to own luxury goods, such as jewelry. Çatal Hüyük prospered from this trade-based wealth.
The main resource of Çatal Hüyük was obsidian, a crystalline black volcanic mineral, mined in the nearby volcanic mountains that surrounded the city. Rock can be worked just like flint and can be used to create tools with a jagged sharp edge. Obsidian was prized for making axes, knives, and polished mirrors. It was traded as far away as Jericho, 800 kilometers away, being transported by pack animals, such as mules and donkeys. In exchange, the merchants received shells and flint, objects highly valued by the citizens of Çatal Hüyük.
Many ceramic pieces and small modeled or sculpted figures were found at the site. Pottery was made by hand, because the potter's wheel had not yet been invented. People also wove cloth, decorated with patterns made with clay pads. Artisans worked the local copper, and other metals, to make simple tools and jewelry, such as necklace beads .
Religion and funeral rites
Each section of Çatal Este has its own room-sanctuary , where religious rites took place. The walls of the sanctuaries were decorated with bull heads modeled in plaster, while geometric drawings were painted on the walls. It is possible that the bull heads were the center of religious ceremonies.
Clay figures, in the form of boars and other animals, were also found with knife wounds, suggesting that the people of Çatal Hüyük practiced sympathetic magic to succeed in hunting (which remained one of their main sources of meat). Some of the Çatal Hüyük shrine walls were decorated with drawings of hunting scenes, with wild animals and leaping warriors.
In addition to performing magical rites, the Çatal Hüyük people may have worshiped an earth goddess who brought fertility. Many figurines of pregnant women were found, made of various materials such as terracotta, marble and volcanic rock. The most famous of these pregnant statuettes is a great earth goddess seated on a leopard throne.
The dead of Çatal Hüyük were buried inside the houses, after an elaborate ritual. First, the bodies were exposed in the open field for the vultures to peck at. When the bones had been cleaned, they were wrapped in an animal skin, cloth, or mat, and tied with a leather cord. Then they were left in a kind of mortuary. In the spring, when houses were being redecorated, the skeletons were placed under a platform inside the house. They were often buried with jewelry, such as shell necklaces, and covered with colored powder.