Why was Catalhoyuk Such an Important Find?

This is a picture of part of the site:

Approximately 8,000 to 9,000 years ago, an extremely important village was built, named Catalhoyuk. Over time, it was covered with many layers of earth – entirely buried. This site was first excavated by James Mellaart in 1958, and is continuing to be excavated today. Archaeologists are taking it slow – they are studying the site to learn more about the Neolithic period. This is a very good example of a thriving civilization. By studying this site, archaeologists were able to learn about early lifestyles, farming, beliefs, and the domestication of plants and animals. In my opinion, this site is very important because it is one of the first villages that were thriving with agriculture. When James Mellaart started the excavation of this site, it was as if a light bulb went off for historians and archaeologists. That site was the perfect example of how prospering communities worked. By studying this site and others that were eventually found, archaeologists and historians were able to get the general idea of how we as the human race have become so developed today.

Catalhoyuk was once a thriving city, fertile and with many animals. It rose up in the time period know as the agricultural revolution, or the Neolithic period. The agricultural revolution is when people started to really think about what was better for their lifestyle. They watched what happened to animals and they watched what happened to plants, and they learned. They learned how to domesticate the animals to have them in complete control. They also realized that they could stay in one place for longer than a couple of weeks! Comparing something such as Terra Amata to this is very easy. In Terra Amata the early humans followed the food. Once agriculture came around, it was different for people. They made the food accommodate them, not the other way around.

With Catalhoyuk, people slowly evolved from nomads to relatively permanent residents of this village. Not only was the soil extremely fertile, but the village was also positioned right by a river, so people didn’t have to go hunt for water as it is today. Because people could control the crops, they were able to stay there for a long time. This also meant that they were able to build more permanent homes, which was very useful. The idea of going hungry was laughable, because now that they had so many crops, they could save some in what they called surplus bins! Now that everybody didn’t have to concentrate on sources of food and water specifically, they were able to go into what we call the division of labor and the specialization of labor. There were some jobs that just needed doing – hunting, building, and so on. These were the divisions of labor. The specializations of labor were similar to our hobbies – crafts, pottery, art, weaving, painting, tool making, and keeping pets. Soon they became in touch with other places around them that had just as fertile soil and were also doing pretty well. This and language led to trading. There were many different things that Catalhoyuk ended up trading, such as art they made, baskets they weaved, beads they formed from rocks, and often the rare rock obsidian which could be useful for making tools. Once they had this whole thing going, they pretty much had culture. They had proper burials for the dead, they had hobbies, they had jobs, they traded instead of using money, and they had the necessary resources to live. And still, when they could have been satisfied, they were curious. What else could they do? What makes us special is that we express our feelings, our emotions, thoughts, concerns, dreams, hopes ideas. Through these, our ancestors ended up creating proper civilizations such as the one we are living in today.

In conclusion, people who lived in Catalhoyuk were very lucky. They just ended up there in one of their migrating endeavors, and they found that they could easily stay there for long periods of time! They finally had time to think about other things they could do than what was absolutely necessary to survive, and their culture grew more and more complex to lead to what we are today. Catalhoyuk was a very important find to archaeologists and historians, and we are very lucky that the village was found. Otherwise, we would have missed a very important step in our humanity to how we became such a complex culture.