Dr. Ruth Tringham will lead a large group of collaborators and participate in the excavation of the archaeological site of Catal Hoyuk. Located on the Konya Plain of Central Anatolia Turkey a small portion of the site was excavated by Dr. James Mellaart in the early 1960s. On the basis of this work Catal Hoyuk has become famous as the world's `earliest city` and for the insights it has provided into the origins of agriculture and early Neolithic religious practice. It's buried architectural remains are well preserved and include embellishment of walls and floors by relief sculptures in clay and painted frescoes. In collaboration with Dr. Ian Hodder and a University of Cambridge team Dr. Tringham will expand on this earlier research. She is focusing on a series of houses which preliminary excavation indicates have a complex occupational history. Catal Hoyuk consists of a `tell` or highly stratified mound which is composed mostly of occupational debris. In the past most archaeologists have divided such tells into `levels` and assumed that each was occupied and then later abandoned simultaneously. Dr. Tringham has reasonable argued that such an assumption is likely incorrect and to understand change through time it makes much more sense to focus on the histories of individual houses. Because such structures are replastered, repainted and remodeled many times, through careful excavation and analysis it is possible to reconstruct their histories. The larger issue Dr. Tringham will address involves the trajectory which leads to complex stratified centralized societies. Based on her past work in Eastern Europe, she notes that the tells characteristic of the Middle East are lacking in Europe. Likewise a similar level of social complexity is not reached. Through the careful excavation and analysis of Catal Hoyuk Dr. Tringham hopes to reconstruct the nature of the social organization which led to groups remaining at a single location long enough to allow tell development. She will contrast this to patterns reconstructed during her European work. Because of the significance of Catal Hoyuk this research will yield results of interest to many researchers. It will help scientists understand the processes which led to the development of state level societies and provide training for both US and Turkish students.
