A temple complex in Turkey that predates even the pyramids

A temple complex in Turkey that predates even the pyramids

Standing on the hill at dawn, overseeing a team of 40 Kurdish diggers, the German-born archeologist waves a hand over his discovery here, a revolution in the story of human origins. Schmidt has uncovered a vast and beautiful temple complex, a structure so ancient that it may be the very first thing human beings ever built. The site isn't just old, it redefines old: the temple was built 11,500 years ago—a staggering 7,000 years before the Great Pyramid, and more than 6,000 years before Stonehenge first took shape. The ruins are so early that they predate villages, pottery, domesticated animals, and even agriculture—the first embers of civilization. In fact, Schmidt thinks the temple itself, built after the end of the last Ice Age by hunter-gatherers, became that ember—the spark that launched mankind toward farming, urban life, and all that followed.

Göbekli Tepe—the name in Turkish for "potbelly hill"—lays art and religion squarely at the start of that journey. After a dozen years of patient work, Schmidt has uncovered what he thinks is definitive proof that a huge ceremonial site flourished here, a "Rome of the Ice Age," as he puts it, where hunter-gatherers met to build a complex religious community. Across the hill, he has found carved and polished circles of stone, with terrazzo flooring and double benches. All the circles feature massive T-shaped pillars that evoke the monoliths of Easter Island.

This theory reverses a standard chronology of human origins, in which primitive man went through a "Neolithic revolution" 10,000 to 12,000 years ago.

"You don't move 10-ton stones for no reason,"

Huge temples did emerge again—but the next unambiguous example dates from 5,000 years later, in southern Iraq.

www.newsweek.com...
Wow, that is pretty amazing article, didn't know this about Turkey,

I think this is the third thread about it during the past 4-5 months.

Anyway, I first "got wind" of it when I watched a BBC documentary titled "The Incredible Human Journey", which debated for the "out of Africa" migration theory and tried to follow it in a sense (using DNA markers as the most "solid" proof). there it showed the Gobekli Tepe site and had an interview of sorts with the leading archeologist on site.

Do a quick search over at youtube.com, maybe it's available to watch. The reference to Gobekli Tepe was in the 2nd episode ("Asia")

reply to post by GoodLuckCharm


That is amazing and by now everyone should be aware of, that human beings didn't freaken evolve, they were smart from the beginning.

We have human beings right now that go hunt with bow and arrows.

We have human beings right now that live in villages made from nothing but wood and leaves.

Don't even think we didn't have geniuses in the past, that is naive.

We did, and some used them, some called them witches and murdered them, some used them to advance for the good of mankind, some used them to advance in the power of destruction etc etc.

This is old.

Evolution does happen, but it is conscious.

If only people could have been smart enough to have language and some way to record all the goings on back then, that would have been impressive. We'd even know the name of the man who built these structures.

Thanks so much for this info! I was not aware of this information. Fascinating! Seems that we just keep uncovering things from the past that gives us new knowledge.

Str8Jackit,

they DID have language, they didn't leave us any writing - that's the missing "link" needed to uncover the details of our past.

LittleSecret,

Humans did evolve, from previous species down the "line" (Homo Erectus, Homo Ergaster, Homo Heidelbergensis - not sure if I listed them in the correct "order" chronologically). What is thought, incorrectly so, is that "primitive" people are simply dumb. Well, they are not dumb! Our species has a "life" of about 200,000 years on this planet and we were not dumb at any part of the "path" to the 21st century. We just don't know for sure how smart we were at times (here comes the lack of written records for the vast majority of our presence on earth, again!).

My personal belief, although I cannot offer any tangible proof for it, is that when the human population dropped so much bringing the whole species at the verge of extinction (I think this is referred to as a "bottleneck", genetically, and it has been verified through DNA tests), each and every one of the "survivors" was a genius. what may be very different than our modern perception of "genius" though is the "type" of genius they possessed. I lean towards the survival skill geniuses, since that was at high demand at the time!

Still, Gobekli Tepe remains a revolutionary find that rewrites our perception of civilization, at least reorientates its time line. Counting what we have found so far, this IS the birthplace of civilized (settled) life for humans, up until then, according to the findings, the hunter-gatherer type was the norm!

reply to post by Maegnas


My belief is that human being evolve, but evolve consciously.

For example, a nation evolves, but only evolves consciously.

How does a nation evolve? By changing its constitution?

Nations are magnified versions of human beings, we can learn much from nations.

We could even learn how to gain immortality through studying nations, and how a nation survives so long.

Nations face the same exact problems as our bodies.

That being said, we can decide to evolve and become stupid, or we can decide to evolve and advance.

IT is all up to us.

GOD says in the Quran that GOD turned a group of people to PIGS, and another group of people to monkeys.

Devolution as we call it, we don't just become advanced, we also can become stupid, and we can evolve to what ever.

That temple complex in Turkey looks very similiar to ancient temples here in Ireland, which also predate the pyramids of Eygpt and stonehenge.

Newgrange, Knowth and The Hill of Tara.

According to James Churchward, the Uyghur people lived in this region after the deluge described in the bible and most creation myths.

Of course, most people will not entertain the thought that the our current iteration of humanity is simply a branch on the family tree of human history.

LittleSecret,

The process of evolution has more to do with the physical "attributes" a species possess. Your view on evolution is more of a spiritual one, which is fine by the way, only it was not the one referred to in the first place, or so I read it. We DID evolve from lesser beings, lesser in the way of intelligence. We DO evolve, everyday, as we grow, individually, and so do our nations/constitutions. I was addressing the physical evolution.

While I will not enter an argument about the relative merits of each religion, I try to stay clear of all of them when discussing matters that can be verified scientifically. What the Quran, the Bible or any other religious scripture says is irrelevant as it cannot be verified (nor is their purpose to provide scientific data, they act like guidelines to our lives and our conduct to each other).

Lady_Tuatha,

That's remarkably similar in shape, kudos for bringing it up. Isn't Newgrange known for an astronomical alignment? I think the sun lights up the inside part of it on the winter solstice, just before it sets? Is that correct?

Maybe alignments of some sort will be found in Gobekli Tepe too. ancient people, lacking TV or other types of "dumbing it down" entertainment and having more practical issues to tackle (when to sow, for example!), turned to the skies and literally mapped every small bit they could observe and its properties. Chief among those observances was the Sun and Moon as they "marked" seasons changing, a vital knowledge for survival of agricultural societies. The fact that astronomical alignments were used to keep track of time, even a "crude" kind of track, in Ireland thousands of years before makes it possible this practice started elsewhere (possibly in Tepe? Why not! It had to start somewhere and Gobekli Tepe IS the oldest permanent settlement we know of).

P.S. check your links for posting those beautiful images as there seems to be something wrong with them. There are bits and pieces of "code" visible and the images themselves act as links, which they should not normally.

reply to post by Maegnas


Yeah Newgrange is astronomically aligned, very much so, if the sky is clear the inner chamber becomes illuminated by a beam of light, this happens on the winter solstice sunrise in newgrange and at the summer equinox at loughcrew (which is lesser known than newgrange but just as striking), the light illuminates the carvings in the chamber, some believe that the carvings signify astronomical alignments and it is also known that Irelands monuments on the Hill of Tara and Newgrange mirror a map of the milkyway.

I think our ancestors were alot more intelligent than we give them credit for hopefully they do find more beautiful alignments in ancient temples around the world.

Sorry for the pics btw, im not very good at it

reply to post by Maegnas

The process of evolution has more to do with the physical "attributes" a species possess. Your view on evolution is more of a spiritual one, which is fine by the way, only it was not the one referred to in the first place, or so I read it. We DID evolve from lesser beings, lesser in the way of intelligence. We DO evolve, everyday, as we grow, individually, and so do our nations/constitutions. I was addressing the physical evolution.

While I will not enter an argument about the relative merits of each religion, I try to stay clear of all of them when discussing matters that can be verified scientifically. What the Quran, the Bible or any other religious scripture says is irrelevant as it cannot be verified (nor is their purpose to provide scientific data, they act like guidelines to our lives and our conduct to each other).

The evolution I'm talking about is also physical lol.

The Darwin evolution doesn't have much evidence to support it, there are holes everywhere.

How can you prove whether evolution is done consciously or not? That is the question, while I argue it is done consciously, and that we can devolve as well as evolve, you state that it is not correct.

You state it is religious, and therefore cannot be scientifically proven, that is false, it is in the same standard as Darwin's evolution.

Let me elaborate, the constitution, other wise nations evolve based on nature right? For example when nature changes, or what ever changes, there will be a need for evolution, for change, and we do change. So if we weren't the ones evolving nations consciously, and didn't know we were conscious, we would have, "scientifically", came to the same conclusion as Darwin. Am I right? Hence natural selection, the idea that we evolve randomly, then through nature, the best one survives. That is incorrect, when considering nations, and how they evolve.

Prove me wrong scientifically since you are so inclined to it.

Read the largest paragraph over and over again, see if you can understand it, ask me for elaboration if you can't.

reply to post by LittleSecret


for something to be done consciously one needs a conscience, right? How did reptiles, for example, evolve? Did the amphibians decide one day "let's go reptile, it sounds fun!"?

Nations are manifestations of humans, thus susceptible to our collective conscience. Evolution of nations of course is not random, it is governed by our ideas and the evolution thereof.

Lady_Tuatha,

No worries about the photos, I only post what few I have posted so far as external links!

You are correct about Newgrange being illuminated by sunrise. Maybe I remember Maeshowe, in the UK.

In Andrew Collins' book 'Gods of Eden' he writes about Gobekli Tepe, aswell as some other ancient cities in this part of the world. Its a while since I read the book and Im no expert so cant remember exact details of times, places and people, so forgive me.

What is interesting though is he states that these civilisations show evidence of agriculture which appears to spring from nowhere (now I know next to nothing about archeology so I couldnt tell anyone how), but he says there are a pattern of these lost cities which seem to start and end one after the other moving further south.

So for example City A has evidence of agriculture at 12000BC and disappears at 10000BC, whilst City B springs out of nowhere with the same knowledge and disappears in the same trait. Finally saying that ancient egypts knowledge of such appears from nowhere (like I say this may be incorrect as im no expert, but its whats in the book ive read).


Ive also read that people from Europe had migrated to africa for whatever reasons, whether this has any credibility or not? But If you take a few of these theories and piece them together an interesting picture could start to emerege.
Also whats interested me on the same subject is these alleged European Pyramids. If there is actually any truth in them then it could be a start of a story which sees ideals and understanding orginating in Europe moving through time to what takes us to the grande and intriguing ancient Egypt.