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every year archaeologists uncover new

sites that enrich our understanding of

the past despite many similarities each

site has a unique tale to tell about

ancient social structures technology

architecture and above all how people

made sense of Life Death and the world

around

them in our modern world we often

distance ourselves from our deceased

relatives our settlement layouts clearly

distinguish between spaces for the

living and the dead it's remarkable to

discover how closely some ancient

societies lived alongside their deceased

loved

ones unlike today's tendency to avoid

confronting death the inhabitants of

chattel hoyuk a Neolithic Village

settlement slept on platforms where

their ancestors were buried the

settlement served as both a living space

and a

cemetery in stark contrast to Modern

attitudes towards death ancient cultures

at chattel hoyuk Place death at the

heart of their rituals in daily life

Welcome to anthom media in this video we

will explore chatt hoyuk an ancient

settlement located in present day

Turkey chatt hoyuk was first excavated

by James melard in the

1960s the site consists of two Mounds

the Neolithic East Mound and the chalal

lithic West Mound the East Mound dating

from 7,400 to 6,000 BC is around 21 M

High its large size of about 13.5

hectares in complex art make it an

important site outside the Southwest

Asian cradle of

civilization while chatt hoyuk is no

longer seen as exceptionally unique due

to the discovery of other significant

sites it remains distinctive in several

ways although many Neolithic sites have

been found in central turkey and the

cona plane cattal hoyuk stands out for

the sheer amount of Art and the detailed

record of daily life it

provides chattel hoyuk displays a

strange blurring between the secular and

the symbolic even to the point of

depositing objects that created memories

of past events such as parts of

figurines and hearths or found

foundations chatt hyuk's extensive art

detailed record of daily life and unique

construction methods make it a

significant site for understanding the

Neolithic

period The Continuous resurfacing of

floors and walls along with the way

houses were abandoned and rebuilt

provides an unparalleled glimpse into

the daily lives of its inhabitants over

thousands of

years excavations reveal densely packed

houses with roof

entrances at its peak the population

estimates for the site range from 3,500

to 8,000 people despite extensive survey

work there is little evidence of public

buildings industrial areas separate

cemeteries and ceremonial

centers all buildings are domestic

houses though they vary in internal

elaboration one indication of large

scale divisions of the Neolithic East

Mound is a large dip or trough across

the middle dividing it into two

Hills the mound does seem to have

developed in two

halves the southern higher Eminence

continued to be occupied after the

general abandonment of the northern Hill

in addition we have found some

differences in consumption and sheep

hering Behavior some Research indicates

genetic differences in the people buried

on the two

sides beyond the large scale division of

the settlement into two parts smaller

groupings of houses have been identified

at chatt

hoyuk in the latter layers of the site

there is evidence of winding Streets

between

houses Recent research has uncovered

Alleyways or boundaries between sectors

of the mound each containing 10 to 50

houses within these sectors there are

even smaller groups of houses with

social and economic

connections small small groups of three

to six houses often share a common main

house which may have served as a

communal burial

site these main houses known as history

houses have more burials and more

architectural features like platforms

and

pillars history houses were rebuilt over

longer periods but they did not control

production or storage and did not have

wealthier burials the social differences

between history houses and other houses

were minimal

at chatt hoyak much of the community's

economic social and ritual life took

place at the household level most houses

consisted of a main room and one to

three side rooms used for storage and

food

preparation the main rooms had

frequently replastered walls with the

entrance ladder or stairs usually

located on the South Wall above the oven

and

hearth the northern part of the main

room was typically High higher cleaner

and more often replastered and this is

where most paintings sculptures

installations and burials were

found although it is often said that the

houses were dark an experimental house

built at the site showed that the main

rooms were quite bright during the day

due to light coming in from the ladder

entry the white plastered walls also

helped reflect light making the side

rooms reasonably well

lit people worked with obsidian near the

ladder entries and stored it in caches

there possibly because of the need for

good

lighting the rooms were likely Smoky due

to layers of soot found on the plaster

walls frequent replastering was probably

necessary to maintain light

reflection evidence of carbon residues

on the ribs of older individuals buried

beneath the floors suggests that people

spent significant time indoors

especially during harsh

Winters both The Young and the old had a

close relationship with the house as

seen in the burials of children and

neonates near doors and

hearths the house was a central place

for living especially during winter and

for the very young and old this provided

opportunities for socialization teaching

social roles and creating routines

within the

community inside the houses space usage

was highly repetitive with main rooms

plastered more frequently than side

rooms the main room floors often had

different levels with the higher areas

covered in white

Plaster these white floors may have been

more heavily covered to keep them

clean the burial practices varied within

the house different categories of people

were buried under different platforms

with young people often under the

Northwest platform and older individuals

under the central East

platform the art and symbolism were also

spatially divided with paintings and

sculptures more common on the east and

west walls and vulture paintings only on

the North and East

walls at chatt hoyuk houses took on many

roles that used to belong to the

community in earlier sites in Anatolia

and West Asia burials often happen

between buildings or in special

structures such as chonu but at chatt

hoyuk burials were mostly inside houses

activities like food preparation

symbolism and rituals which used to be

public as illustrated by gockley teepe

were now done inside the

house houses became key places for

teaching social roles and

behaviors however this shift made

individual houses more important at the

expense of the larger

community in the upper levels of the

site there's evidence of economic

changes and the breakdown of

CommunityWide rules houses started to

function more indep dependently and the

strong social cohesion of the community

began to

weaken in the Neolithic period unlike

hunter gatherer societies who lived in

the present people at chattle hoyuk

lived in a world deeply connected to the

past the settlement's Deep layers with

houses built on top of one another

display how they managed and preserved

their

history many houses at chattel hoyuk

were lived in for 50 to 100 years and

maintaining these mud brick structures

was a

challenge the walls tended to lean and

bend so the people developed techniques

like doubling the walls building houses

close together for support and using

horizontal wooden braces in the

walls when a house was abandoned it was

sometimes used as a dump site other

times new houses were built in the same

spot using the same layout over multiple

rebuilds longlived houses often had more

burials beneath their

floors while the average house had five

to eight burials some had as many as 62

including secondary burials from other

houses the use of space in history

houses remained consistent over time

helping to establish and maintain

historical memories this consistency is

seen in repeated paintings and relief

sculptures across different phases and

levels of the buildings

for instance pairs of relief leopards

appear in several buildings and in two

cases they are placed directly above

each other in a distinctive style

suggesting deliberate commemorative

memory these history houses often

contained human remains with many

burials beneath the floors sometimes

body parts were retrieved and

reused for example teeth from one

skeleton were placed in another

individual's jaw in a l

building skulls were especially

significant and were sometimes kept and

placed at the base of house posts or

added to

burials one notable example is in a

building where the tops of upright

wooden pillars were plastered to place a

human skull on top of

it the practice of creating and

maintaining histories at chatt hoyuk

involved the repetition of house

construction and passing down human

skulls

at chatt Hoak the house played a key

role in preserving memory this is also

seen with wild animal heads there was a

common pattern of destroying the West

walls of the main rooms to remove

sculptures the heads and feet hands of

relief figures likely depicting bears

were always removed before buildings

were filled

in the wild bull was a prominent image

in chattle hyuk's art and was important

in

feasting the bones of wild male cattle

were often found in large quantities

suggesting they were used in significant

feasts although these feasting

activities might not have been

concentrated in the history houses but

wild bull horns were often displayed in

these elaborately decorated

houses in the latter period of chatt

Hoak the tradition of creating elaborate

houses with real bull horns reliefs and

paintings declined bullhorns and wild

animal parts were less frequently used

in house decorations and some horns were

made of plaster rather than real

ones this shift might be due to a

decrease in wild cattle and other wild

animals in the

area instead of using real wild animals

people began to represent them in

pottery and

paintings in later periods small

symbolic bullheads appeared as handles

on pottery and paintings to depicted

scenes of teasing and baiting wild

animals which introduced a narrative

element to their art stamped seals with

abstract signs also emerged suggesting a

more symbolic and discursive approach to

rituals in the upper levels of city and

horde ceased and pottery became more

diverse and decorated by the chalal

lithic period about 6,000 BC Pottery

featured complex designs burial

practices also changed with fewer adult

burials inside

houses instead there were Collective

burials in decorated tombs and

associations of animal and human bones

indicating evolving

rituals house construction and urban

layout

transformed houses became larger

multi-roomed and often two-story with

buttresses added to support the walls

the town became more dispersed and

fragmented with the emergence of streets

and street level entrances

a combination of economic independence

from domestic animal and seral

production and external factors like

climate change might have influenced

this

shift the occupation at chattel hoyu can

be divided into three periods the early

phase was from 7,030 BC the middle phase

was from 6,600 BC and the later phase

was from 6,400

BC during its peak in the middle period

the population and housing density were

at their

highest towards the end of the

occupation on the East Mound the

surrounding environment changed from a

wetland to a more stable dry

ground various analyses confirmed this

by showing a decline in fish Moc wood

and plant diversity consequently the

population declined houses were more

spaced out and there was an increased

use of Open

Spaces the site was eventually abandoned

by around 6,000 BC shifting towards

multiple small to mediumsized early

chalcolithic sites instead of a single

dense

settlement this transition coincided

with a significant Global Climate event

around 6,200 BC which brought drought

conditions to much of Africa and Asia

these climatic changes likely

contributed to the end of the East Mound

occupation and the relocation to the

West Mound

at chatt hoyuk there was little evidence

of specialized roles or distinct

political and social functions instead

the town appeared to function through

the repetition of social behaviors

within individual

houses daily routines reinforced social

order teaching people the roles and

rules of their society these routines

were embedded in a rich symbolic system

centered around wild animals and

ancestors buried under the floors

rather than having a centralized

hierarchy or public ceremonies social

rules and rituals were learned and

enforced within each house the elaborate

house-based symbolism and rituals

provided a strong sense of power and

meaning this focus on domestic Cults and

body regulations contributed to the

formation of a very large Village rather

than a traditional

town to access the rights and resources

associated with a house individuals

needed to be part of its history and

symbolism this often meant being

physically connected to the House's

Fabric and its

burials as the site grew houses likely

clustered around history houses with

many burials and a long period of

reuse being near these ancestral homes

was crucial for maintaining social and

resource

rights over time economic and

environmental changes led to to a

shift in the later part of the 7th

millennium BC there was a move towards

more intensive use of domesticated

plants and animals reducing Reliance on

wild animals houses transformed from

ritual centers to centers of production

and consumption the history house system

declined and houses became larger and

multi-roomed chattle hoyuk flourished

largely due to its control over the

obsidian trade

a valuable volcanic glass sourced from

nearby mountains however obsidian was

just one among many materials traded by

Southwest Asian farmers starting around

9,000 BC items like Marine shells jedite

Serpentine turquoise and other exotic

goods were exchanged through barter

across Villages these exchanges likely

served not only to acquire rare

materials but also to strengthen social

ties the w widespread trade of raw

materials accelerated the spread of

Innovations such as shepherding pottery

making and eventually metalurgy of

copper and

bronze studies using spectrographic

analysis of obsidian fragments from

hundreds of sites across turkey and

Mesopotamia show that each obsidian

Source has distinct Trace elements

allowing researchers to trace its

distribution from various

locations the percentage of obsidian

found found decreases with distance from

its source suggesting that early farming

communities engaged in down the line

bartering passing Goods along from

Village to

Village chattel hoyuk relied on

domesticated plants and animals with

wheat dominating the crops and sheep

being the most common livestock wild

plants and animals were also consumed

but were less important in the

diet the community symbolic art

depicting Wild animals and hunting

scenes suggests that hunting held social

significance despite being a minor part

of their

diet most farming likely occurred in

better drained areas 13 km south of the

settlement requiring considerable labor

and Mobility for cultivation and

transport evidence suggests increased

Mobility over time with herders

traveling greater distances to find

resources additionally raw materials for

bead and pottery making shifted from

local to non-local sources indicating

expanded territory

use this shift resulted from a move from

communitybased to household-based

economies leading to Greater resource

depletion near the settlement and

necessitating further travel for

resources over 300 skeletons were

uncovered at chatt

hoyuk analysis showed a preference for

primary single burials in noval pits

under house floors bodies were often

flexed and sometimes wrapped in cloth or

accompanied by various grave Goods like

shells beads and

tools most burials lacked grave Goods

though some showed evidence of

dismemberment or missing skulls and

limbs one plastered and painted skull

was found with an adult female skeleton

similar to other NE Eastern

finds archaeological surveys of the Kane

plain show a pattern of increasing

population density and habitation

culminating in the emergence of chatt

hoyuk as a prominent

Community initial small settlements in

the region like banku clu hoyuk may have

Amalgamated to form chatt hoyuk

transforming from a few dispersed

dwellings into a large dense

settlement population growth at chattle

hoyuk was likely driven by increased

fertility and birth rates

the sight skeletal remains reveal a high

percentage of juveniles indicating a

higher birth rate traditional

interpretations of high juvenile

mortality have shifted to understanding

these numbers as a sign of population

growth and

fertility juvenility indexes show a peak

in population growth during the middle

period followed by a decline in the late

period other factors such as immigration

might have contributed to population

growth but evidence suggests this was

unlikely settlement data show little

population outside of chatt hoyuk during

its peak an analysis reveals no

significant influx of

migrants the diet at chattel hoyuk

played a crucial role in sustaining its

high population

growth analysis of plant and animal

remains indicates a heavy Reliance on

serial grains particular wheat and

barley and domesticated animals

especially

sheep there is an observed increase in a

higher consumption of animal protein

possibly due to the introduction of

domesticated

cattle breastfeeding led to higher

nitrogen values in infants which began

to decline around 18 months as weaning

started and returned to Baseline Levels

by about 3

years this pattern is typical of

traditional farming societies and

indicates that children were vulnerable

to infections during the weaning process

due to a compromised immune

system chattel hoak's social structure

was characterized by a shift towards

practical kinship and household Centric

organization driven by the demands of

early farming practices and communal

living this departure from traditional

biological kinship models highlights the

Adaptive nature of social organization

in response to to Agricultural

intensification and Community

consolidation during the Neolithic

period

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