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Posted by Michael Bulatovich on January 20, 2008, 8:42 am
>
>
> Jude Alexander wrote:
>
>>
>>>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6bekli_Tepe
>>>
>>
>>Thanks for the link. Seems logical that there were lesser refined
>>buildings (as these buildings are fairly refined) before people starting
>>improving on their skills.
>
> Or that buildings being in done in quite different materials were being
> replicated in stone. One example of this is the so-called Hellenistic
> carvings of furniture and architectural elements like beams in the caves
> of Bamiyan (probably blown up along with the Buddhas under the Taliban)
> and similar elements in "Desert Cathay". They were simply, in the first
> millenium BC, a way of expressing quite another kind of home to the cave's
> somewhat sophisticated inhabitants
Probably so, but I think the point is that if they could do this in *ninth*
millenium BC, it probably points to an even earlier mastery of acrhitectural
technology, and even this site is pushing backwards the assumed date and
circumstances when this technology was developed.
The fact that people were doing amazing buildings so far back is one thing,
but I really find it much more curious that this site was *intentionaly
buried*. I'm not sure of the date of covering, but even if animals were
domesticated by then, it must have been a huge undertaking, and of great
significance. Any bored fool can destroy stuff, but to *bury* it intact must
have had meaning that we can only guess at for now.
Anyway, I'm glad Klaus Schmidt didn't quit school at twelve, and I hope he
pieces the whole story together. My habitual structural engineer is a Turk
( ..and my kid's best friend is an Shqiptar! ) and he says that Asia Minor
is so littered with ancient sites that they themselves barely knew anything
about it when he was coming up in school. He just came back from a business
trip to Istanbul and says they're building, with permits, a Four Seasons
hotel on a known Roman site in the city. You wonder how much of this stuff
will get dozed in the name of progress before they realize what that word
means after you all have dishwashers and cars and iPods.
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