Is it time we started to question interpretation?
Posted On: Jan 9th, 2018 at 12:12
Turkey
My question is a rhetorical one.
Göbekli Tepe is by far the oldest site in the world. Dating to around 12,000 years ago, it is also the weirdest site in the world. Sinister, bizarre, and even paranormal to the extent that fundamental questions raise serious issues regarding the time we are living in today – that there is a direct connection between the two if certain interpretations of the carvings are to be believed. But that’s a story for another day.
In this article, yet again by the Guardian (although they cannot be held fully responsible for repeating what’s been said), we find loose assumptions based on scant evidence.
For a start the term ‘skull cult’ brings up visualisations of a group of primitive humans involved in cannibalistic activities and spending their time carving cranial bones. In fact those at Göbekli Tepe were so advanced it’s utterly frightening, and we are still scratching our heads trying to figure out the meaning of the site. Although the term ‘skull cult’ is based on certain criteria which is laid out in the original paper, most likely to eliminate these preconceived notions from the mind of the reader, we are still left with ideas that are wrong.
We also find the quote: “The site dates to a time when people were in transition from hunter-gatherers to farmers. The people of Göbekli Tepe had not domesticated plants or animals, but settled in the area, and used what resources they found around them.”
If I had a pound for every time this phrase was used I’d be a millionaire. These two sentences have no meaning whatsoever and I start to wonder if they are pinned up on the walls of journalists, ready to use when an archaeological story comes along. Firstly, until recently it was believed that ‘people were in transition from hunter-gatherers to farmers’ around 5,000 years ago. The discovery of Göbekli Tepe and other sites is constantly pushing this date back. But also this phrase has absolutely no meaning whatsoever, for a definition of this so-called transition is extremely fluid. It’s not as if there was a single, world-wide transition from hunting to farming, and clearly the two were never mutually exclusive. The second sentence in that phrase is nothing more than a joke; another regurgitated guess on the mark of the author.
We also see the phrase, ‘“They think the power from the dead is going to the living,” said Gresky.’ Now this is an actual quote from the scientist or archaeologist involved, but quite frankly I’d like to slap them around the face! On what grounds can you make such a guess? In what circumstances does this person think they can assume what was going on in the minds of those who were using the site 12,000 years ago?
The final example I’d like to give is the last paragraph: “Lee Clare, another scientist on the study, said that the shift towards settled life will have brought on new challenges as the population grew. The site itself would have served to build the group’s collective identity, one which could have been bolstered by the rituals of the skull cult.”
What a load of nonsense! Again, how do you, or can you, make such a statement based on little evidence?
It’s been argued by many that archaeology is not an actual science. This is a question that I have had to ponder on archaeology courses, and quite frankly the answer is very difficult. While we can say that the interpretation and measurement of stratigraphic layers and the finds within them are certainly being uncovered using the scientific method, the interpretation of every site and every find is open to manipulation by the minds of the those involved.
I’d like to see less guessing and more science, but sites like these don’t appear in the mainstream media without a sensational story attached to them, or in reference to an already well-known site, and therein lies the problem. Perhaps archaeology needs to go a little more ‘underground’…
