Archaeologists Make Incredible Discovery: They May Have Found the World's Oldest Civilization

It's a real bombshell! It seems that before the pyramids were built, before people invented writing, in the heart of today's Turkey there flourished a civilization that was ahead of its time by millennia. Today, thanks to spectacular archaeological discoveries, Taş Tepeler is once again emerging from the shadow of oblivion.

In southeastern Turkey, archaeologists have uncovered traces of one of humanity's most fascinating mysteries, a lost Stone Age civilization now known as the Taş Tepeler (Turkish for "Stone Hills" ) culture. Its origins date back 11,500 years, making it the oldest known civilization with advanced architecture and social structures.

Ongoing research, led by teams from Turkey , the UK and Germany , among others, has already revealed some 30 settlements. This is only half of what archaeologists suspect exists. The most famous sites, such as Göbekli Tepe , Karahan Tepe and Sayburç , can be visited today, and many discoveries end up in the museum in Şanlıurfa , which collects priceless sculptures , figurines and everyday objects from a time before ceramics or metal were invented.

It turns out that Taş Tepeler is the civilization that was the first to create monumental structures: huge ritual halls with stone pillars decorated with bas-reliefs and sculptures of animals and people . Underground rooms with domed ceilings have also been discovered, as well as traces of large settlements with up to a thousand inhabitants.

- These discoveries are of great international importance - emphasizes Professor Necmi Karul from the University of Istanbul , who leads the excavations.

In his opinion, the Taş Tepeler culture may have been the first organized society in history, and its legacy shows how early man began to think in terms of community , ritual and symbolism .

Among the finds are gigantic sculptures of ancestors and dozens of realistic representations of wild animals : leopards, vultures, snakes and bulls. These are often strong and dangerous species, which may suggest that these were figures associated with beliefs and spiritual identification of people with the power of nature .

There are also controversial discoveries, such as statues of men holding their genitals or images of women with exposed sexual characteristics , which indicate a fertility cult and perhaps a ritual meaning of life and death .

Although this civilization survived for 1,500 years, it eventually disappeared without a trace. Archaeologists believe it was an extremely advanced, but ultimately fragile form of social organization.

- The earliest community institutions and large-scale ritual structures appeared in this part of the world. This was a real breakthrough in human history - says Prof. Douglas Baird from the University of Liverpool .

New discoveries show how little we know about our future.