Old Maps, Expeditions and Explorations: Gobekli Tepe: Garden of Eden?

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Gobekli Tepe: Garden of Eden?

Since the dig began in 1994, experts have made the journey to Kurdish Turkey to marvel at these 40-odd standing stones and their Neolithic carvings.

Klaus Schmidt says: "Gobekli Tepe is staggeringly old. It dates from 10,000BC, before pottery and the wheel. By comparison, Stonehenge dates from 2,000BC. Our excavations also show it is not a domestic site, it is religious - the world's oldest temple. This site proves that hunter-gatherers were capable of complex art and organised religion, something no-one imagined before."

Digging for history in Turkey - An archaeological dig tells us more about the Garden of Eden, says Sean Thomas.

See also:
Gobekli: your questions answered
Sean Thomas answers some FAQ.

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Abkhazia

My favourite is the story of 19th century 'negotiations' between an up-coming Russia and a declining Ottoman Turkey in which Russia demanded the cession by Ottoman -Turkey of the province of Abkhazia. The Turkish delegates who had been summoned to the Czar's palace had little idea of their empire, where Abkhazia was or how big a loss it would represent to Ottoman Turkey. It's actually 8,600 sq kilometers, or 40% of a Wales for those who prefer more traditional area measurements. However there was a map of Abkhazia hanging on the Czar's palace walls, alongside a similarly-sized map of the palace gardens - no scale to either map, although the latter was probably at a somewhat larger scale. Based on these 2 maps the Ottoman delegation concluded they were ceding an insignificant piece of territory.- Dr Hillary Shaw