Mardin, midyat, and coming back to GT

A couple weeks ago, I took a trip to Mardin, then Midyat, then outside of Dargeçit… a winding path to visit Boncuklu Tarla, Field of Beads. I left for Mardin with some new dear friends— being in Türkiye is a lot of reuniting with long lost new friends— and spent a couple days orienting and getting to this Tigris-neighboring city on a hill, established more than 3000 years ago. Not a big deal. Mardin has nice windy airflow, up a bit in altitude (that’s a strong word but you what I mean), with long-reaching views stretching well across the border into Syria. Over and over, you hear people say “Mesopotamia” while looking out across the horizon because, contrary to Wikipedia (and, weirdly, plenty of scholarly journals), Mesopotamia reached across, yes, Iraq, but also across Anatolia, right where Mardin now sits. As great as books are, there’s so much knowledge passed through the technology of talking, and in songs and dance and in the art and a whole host of other modes and means.

My friends had rented a car so I got to travel with such ease with them to Dara, the ancient eastern Roman city, walking through its stunning Necropolis, then singing in its cisterns (these were built probably a bit later into early Christian times), and then sweltering (but with fascination) in its vast city ruins. We saw remarkably intact mills, enormous hypo-style stone walls, public and private dwelling spaces… it’s impossible to not sound redundant, but the fortress wall, even as it crumbles on the sides, is very impressive. I’ve run out of words for giant-enormous-megalithic feats of construction and how mind-boggling they are, what they say about the beliefs, values, and consciousness of a given society. I’m not necessarily laying a value judgment on these consciousness just… dang, these buildings are giant.

I went on to Midyat with a hope and a dream to make it to Boncuklu Tarla, staying at a haven of a little inn who helped find me someone intrepid enough to drive the 40 minutes outside of town. I say intrepid because the structural engineering student, S, who kindly drove me texted with a picture of a SUV and said he was ready for “off-roading.” It was around that moment that I wondered what sort of chaos I was bringing into both our lives by asking to be driven to this 13,000-year-old archaeological site, but I told myself to get it together, give it a go… we can always turn back if it was too, I don’t know, off road? Cut to the actual drive— all paved, all very scenic, rolling beautiful hills and plateaus, feeling very Montana in its vistas. We talked about his name, which means descended from kings, and about the names of the area. We listened to Kurdish jams. I took funny long videos of the vistas, like a recently-landed alien visitor. We arrived to the site, following the google maps location, and found ourselves in front of a locked gate. I gulped, knowing I had, of course, screwed the pooch. I’d asked the tourism office and the police station in town and also the archaeo team at GT and all had been fairly causal about the whole thing— “don’t see why you can’t visit?” was the general vibe. But now, there was a big locked gate and chainlink fence between us and the apparent site location… and I felt like a dingdong. We walked along the side of the gate, me in my jelly shoes (special excavation issue/100L at the drugstore in Urfa) and I tried willing the gate open a few different ways in my mind. The driver noticed the big hole in the fence at the same time as me and just shook his head with a very clear “don’t even think about it.” We shared a moment or two of WTF and then S hopped to action, calling his friend who lived in the area. I tried to listen in for any phrases that resembled “American fool,” because that would be justified, but the Kurdish flew over my head. He got off the phone and said that his friend would call right back. Then we waited, more music, and me making silent prayers to the site gods. Not 8 minutes later, a car pulled up behind us and a couple men got out and they were unlocking the fence. Turns out, the friend had called his buddy, the site direction, Dr. Ergül Kodaş, and we were getting a very special, very unplanned, very privileged tour. We spoke in Turkish, English, and I listened in French, all languages he spoke. It was amazing, exhilarating, beautiful to see the long-stretching site with pillars, not t-pillars, and circular enclosures similar to GT…PPNA, PPNB, long stretches of time and building styles, the swooping mountains framing this valley-set site. Much wetter, more lower-alpine feeling than GT. (Image courtesy of Mardin Archaeology Museum.)

They kindly invited us to tea at their house and we met some of the other archaeologists and Dr. Kodaş wife, Charlotte, a soon-to-be doctor of archaeology herself, and I got to ask all kinds of questions, and generally take in this very similar but very different environment and excavation. Hopped a ride with the family back to town, my cells happy-happy from S’s ingenious call, from the gifts of this welcome and the kismet coming together of it all.

That night, I had gone out to see some of Midyat and meet a master silversmith who introduced me to a doctor of archaeology from Midyat who does fascinating ethnographic-historical work in town. These two buddies took me on a tour around town, visiting an Assyrian church service with incense and singing, finished with tea on the veranda with her family overlooking where the old town and new town meet. Overflowing hospitality here and so many connections and insights sparking from visiting this further-away site and these new friendships. Letting all of this cook in the stew for a bit… more soon!

And, PS… would you like to go on a little side quest with me? Okay, back to Mardin… officially (?), Mardin draws its name from Marida a term found in Kurdish and Syriac for “fortress.” Makes sense. Word on the street/so I’ve heard from multiple sources (a highly scientific survey) is that Mardin’s previous names have been Merlin and Merylin and variations on Mary Mother of God. Interesting to note that Mardin is within the Artuklu District and is known for its Artuqid architecture and please just let me enjoy the similarity of Artuqid to Arthur as in Arthurian legend, which one Joseph Campbell (Romance of the Grail: The Magic and Mystery of Arthurian Myth) had suggested drew substantially from Persian, Arab, Islamic and potentially other distinct yet simultaneous traditions…. and then we have Merlin, a very specific archetype and character in Arthurian legend. While Arthurian legend has been coded as Western European READ white, Anglo-Saxon, there’s compelling reception studies of this tradition pointing it to what was known in the 10th and 11th centuries as Persian love poetry and other syncretically-connected traditions (Modarres’s “A Comparative Study of Two Romances: The English Morte d'Arthur and the Persian Samak-e-Ayyar” for example). And, as well, the strong Gral/Grail significance in Arthurian legend and this city’s ties to Mary, the Divine Mother. I don’t anything to be a fact or unshakable reality but I do sense that this area is a nexus of cultures and traditions and a place where we might listen in for complexity instead of simplicity. It’s a possible connection and it’s interesting, at the least. A vast universe of contemplation to be sure to ponder histories that hinge upon Europe’s “whiteness,” as both the category of whiteness and its intrinsic connection with Europe may well be a constructed, a later-on revisionist history, when compared with myriad examples of European plurality of culture, ethnicity and race. Interesting meeting places of possibilities and re-listening into histories, connections. Yeah, so that’s been bangin’ around my head for a while, since hearing these little wisps, little phonemes of potential connections. The Assyrian tradition in Mardin and Midyat is fascinating and an area of history on which I am trying to catch up… as well as basically all of the intertwined yet distinct traditions, plus the vastness of time and the constant tug between specific individuals, communities and wider patterns of history.

A few weeks in…

Merhaba! Hello. It’s been a few weeks, a lot of things to ponder and process, a lot of streets and paths and ways up and down. Speaking mythologically, in the vocabulary and lexicon of myth and poetry, I have observed that this place—Şanlıurfa—feels like a dreamscape. A dreamscape in the sense that a potentiality hangs in or flows through the air, it’s all around. When you leave the house, anything can happen. Not just anything but something— something will happen. Something I needed to have happen that I couldn’t quite have planned. A through-line so far has been all the friendship and connection I’ve been gifted— the welcome and kindness is fairly immense and pretty moving to me. I wandered into the Tourism Office (the official city tourist info center) and I met wonderfully kind and inviting, super interesting and cool folks there and have since been invited to a lovely couple’s house where they shared so much helpful insight about all things archaeological sites, all about the dynamics of the city, all about their experiences living there. The woman who runs the hostel where I’m staying (I joke with her a lot that “I live here now”) is so great and we regularly have work-study hangouts where we sit on the floor in the AC and clack away on our respective computers. These friendships and connections have offered me so much and I remain curious about how easeful these friendships are here, how they just seem to arrive at my door, with me having done nothing in particular. I’ve also enjoyed getting to know people passing through town— a lovely woman from Poland was my travel partner to Mardin for the first time. A very kind man from Germany who came to visit family in Türkiye invited me to a Sira, a traditional/local feast and dance celebration, with beautiful live music and singing. Two darling lovely people, fellow students from Ankara, met me on the bus back from Göbekli Tepe and, even with our phone batteries nearly dead (aka Google translate wasn’t so much an option) we became friends and toured all around the town together for a few days in a row. Heart friends who I hope to see again soon, in the future. One gifted me a beautiful book with her own notes and underlined important parts in it and it meant so much to me. And new neighbors arrived at the hostel this week- a wonderful Brazilian couple who invited me into their Mardin adventure and who are seeking mythic thematic threads of the ophidian, the Divine Mother and the embodied feminine in their travels. We’ve been having an amazing adventure and it felt like total alchemical providence to meet them! I feel so lucky to know these people and, frankly, I feel very cared for by the world/universe/cosmos.

For the first 2 weeks, I’ve was on-site at Gobekli Tepe basically from 7 am to 2 pm, which is the work day for the archaeological team and excavators. What a complete and utterly surreal honor and privilege to get to accompany and observe the excavation from such a close vantage point. This welcome and access is a constant source of wonder to me. It’s also strange to find, in some moments, that standing amidst the towering t-pillars has become normal, a perfectly normal and usual place to be. Then I snap back into the here and now and remember what an unspeakably rarified and special thing it is to be there, right now and also back then, way back then.

I got sick (some kind of respiratory flu thing that wasn’t covid) and tried to pretend I wasn’t sick (just to myself, mostly) and had to sleep for a couple days. I did not like that but I probably needed to do this to down shift to a workable gear, instead of the go-go-push-push-put-put-bang I started in when I arrived. Chill the eff out, ma’am.

I’m now into the phase of my research where I’m inviting and seeking conversations with members of the communities surrounding this site (both in Şanlıurfa and the Kurdish village most connected to the site) on the origins of, the known history of, the associations with and the significance of Gobekli Tepe, and the way in which these conversations always happen at the intersection of me stating an intention aka asking for help and the serendipitous dreamscape mystery swirl which offers up collaborators, narrators, players and mentors here. I’ve had the privilege of speaking with some members of the family that owned the farm upon which Gobekli Tepe is sat, who came upon statues from this distant time and brought them to the attention of the local museum. I’ve gotten to speak with tour guides in the town, to listen into the narratives and metaphors and stories that they can share. I’ve spoken with so many people on the platform (walkway) that surrounds the main site of Gobekli Tepe, inviting conversation with visitors about what brought them there, how the site strikes them, what thoughts or feelings come to mind. I’ve spoken with many people in the town of Şanlıurfa and still feel like I would need 12,000 more years to listen enough. I often leave my house with no plan at all, just knowing I need to get out into a walk before the extra weird extrovert-who-hasn’t-extroverted-enough ennui sets in. As I walk, I experience the concurrent inner journey of the moment, to the tune of hey, I don’t quite worry about whether people are staring at me and look at me, I’m more relaxed here in my own skin. I’ve tried many different ways of looking, different code-switching via dress, and I’ve landed back on the way I generally dress, kind of a utilitarian-enough-covered-up-slightly-obnoxious-BK-hipster-plus-a-shawl kind of style.

I’ve been in Şanlıurfa for basically one month and I have found myself in the silent beautiful overwhelm of days filled with so much newness, oldness, so many new people, so many big questions. I keep asking myself to write and take notes and write blog posts and make videos. There’s a Ferdinand-like sweet-summer-child bull in me that just wants to chew the grass of the experience in silence and doesn’t have anything to say yet. It’s amazing how tangled I can get in my own fears and worries (“What am I even doing here??”/“Does everybody think I’m ridiculous?”/“Does my research make any sense?”/“What do I do with all the plans I made and had to change??”, and so on and so forth) and how much relief I feel when I or other people’s generosity pulls me out of these worries, doubts, inner dramas. And still, I’m trying to study and be present to all the dramas, inner and outer, as packets of symbols, even archetypes, of this experience. I feel grateful for the chance to make my own way here, with so much inspiration and help from all the people around me and from writers and thinkers and imaginations I have access to through books and my comparative myth program, from various sources.

It’s hot out. Really hot, hot like pizza oven. At night it gets a little better but it’s just a warm place in the world. Listen, I know a lot of places are warm on our planet…here, at least I can tell you about here: arriving at a place or at home involves lots of sighing and gulping down water, a communal chorus of relief at things like shade, cold water, or sweet sweet air conditioning.

The progression of my life and schedule and work here has been pretty organic and- I’m convinced- part of an immense swirl of a dreamscape upon which this town was founded. They said “don’t make plans when you’re here” because they’ll change anyway… this feels fairly congruent with my MO anyway, but it’s the letting go of expectations of myself and others— aren’t I supposed to be getting a lot “done”? These are just my senses… that this “City of Prophets,” as Şanlıurfa is known, is a place that draws people to it who have a wish and a desire, desiring for something unspeakable, for something in the past or in the future just out of reach. The way we think about a place, communally, culturally, socially, may create the place itself as a living metaphor, a city of archetypes, and then visitors and inhabitants alike inhabit this landscape and intuit the thoughts of the place through our mythic modes, our human spider senses for narrative, image and symbol. Could these themes have emerged or been present in the mythic landscape of Göbekli Tepe’s builders and inhabitants? How does this theme of desiring, wishing, and hoping permeate and/or intersect with our interpretations, individual and communal or in certain disciplines or camps (scientific, esoteric, etc) of this site? How do we project and why do we project certain stories upon the people of the past? Who do they have to be so that we can be __________?

I’ll write more soon about Karahantepe, about Mardin and Midyat and Buncuklu Tarla. Görüşürüz!

Landing in türkiyE

Aug. 5- Aug. 11:

Istanbul —> Sanliurfa

This is a round-up of Türkiye-so-far, which includes two cities, 6 to 7 days (depending upon your timezone counting), so many cats, a certain amount of candy, 6-8 miles walked a day, a shameful amount of plastic water bottles, and (currently) vigorous drumming and music outside my door. [I learned that the correct spelling/pronunciation is officially, for in America or here or anywhere, Türkiye and calling it “Turkey” is not so preferred.] I have been here for less than a week today! One week since I took off from the states. I feel like I’ve been away for a month already. Does everyone say this? Have you had experiences like this, that bend time and space? I know we all have. It’s definitely the language and then every single thing else… the smells, sights, the newness, the oldness, and being pulled from my social fabric, as new as it’s been in LA. I spent the first 4 nights in Istanbul— a little change of plans because the excavation team was arriving later than I’d originally planned— which gave me a good footing in getting the run of the city (I know, it’s just a quick footing for such an expansive place but the learning curve is sharp in the first few days?), to get out of each increasingly larger comfort zones, so that I was walking across the bridge into the bigger big city, out of the old town into the new and beyond city. Many places I walked on that big walk, on my way to Taksim Square, felt like a blend of SF and Soho/NYC and a Brazilian city. I met a friend, Yun-Hsin from Taiwan- we were both saying hello to some special cats (ALL THE CATS ARE SPECIAL) and I knew instantly that we’d be buddies. She went to U of Nebraska to get her doctorate in music, which is cool as hell. We went to the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque and the Grand Bazaar together, and it was sweet to have a friend and shared new eyes to this old city. Being in Istanbul, I felt simultaneously exhausted and like I was on the most free and breezy vacation. This is a funny time for maybe more than just me— it seems like a time when I’m really aware of giving myself a hard time and wanting to be on my timing and in my lane. And impatience at the edges, even if there’s nothing to do. Mostly I get to battle with self-doubt (BORING) but I’m about done with that life partner. Let’s go for heartfilled loving trying and envisioning and doing. I feel like this is a great chance to try this newness out for myself. There is so much to notice here, much more than anywhere I’ve been lately.

Speaking of this, I go to Göbekli Tepe, the actual site, tomorrow. (I’ve been kickin’ around the palatial museum in Sanliurfa, which has a lot of pieces from the excavation and has models of the t-pillars… it’s the AC version of the site?) (I read a hilarious review of the site, a travel-blogger who called the site exhorbidantly expensive and a “real rip-off”! I love the idea of, comedically-speaking, an archaeological site as being a rip-off. 11,000 years old? Not impressive. Very few amenities. Hilarious!!) (TO BE FAIR: Obsessed as I am, it could be true that it’s not a place that makes everybody’s hearts sing…) (Just kidding!! EVERYBODY GET INTO IT!!) So then I got on a plane to Sanliurfa 2 days ago and this entailed a whole new airport, SAW, and shenanigans ala delays followed by my heart swelling, when I least expected it—knee deep in some academic reading and in a slight power struggle with the man in front of me—as we landed. How bare and beautiful and dry the land was and milky-hazy the air was as we landed in tandem with the dusky sun set. The wall of heat. Grabbed my checked bag pretty quickly and stood outside the airport just watching people, a weird bemused peace surrounding me- watching grandmas scooping up grandkids near popped trunks, the people boarding the public buses— should I get on that bus? I could get on that bus? I push off to ask about the bus and a man comes out of nowhere (not really- this is just me never knowing fully what’s going on, is all) and says no, take a taxi, wrong way. He helps me with my bag and I get dropped off with a driver who turns on the meter and I pummel him with questions for all 35 minutes drive in broken Turkish. We pass by olive vineyards, pistachio orchards? If they’re not orchards, I’m still calling them orchards. We talk through our respective google translates. So different now, this technology. It makes it easier, it makes it harder. I’m definitely cheating, being able to look up whole sentences. We’ve skipped the (probably definitely) vitally important phoneme phase of learning Turkish and leap-frogged to full robot translation. But I’m also doing this whole landing in Turkey thing in my classically outgoing way, and I close my hotel room each night uttering out loud “I love this place, I love these walls, I love this AC, I love this shower,” because maybe, just maybe I’ve exhausted myself talking to every single soul I come across, against their will or not. I’m proud of myself for showing up as me. There’s no other way? We each have to show up as ourselves, I keep telling myself. The one time today I was mad was when a woman with her two kids called me a tourist but she was doing a very tourist thing. The heat had peaked to 105F and it was just as simple as that. We were also at a necropolis and, well, either way, petty feels are present, along with some pretty lofty loving feels. I don’t even think she was being unkind, I’m just an American woman who reacts fearfully if someone doesn’t crack some kind of smile in my presence. People here, in Sanliurfa and Istanbul, are incredibly generous— obliging, very giving with their time, energy, resources, WhatsApp numbers, insta handles, directions, rides and walks, and cups of çay (tea). Above and beyond is the way here, I know I’m right even if I’ve been here for 2 seconds.

I was in the enormous Archaeological Museum and this 10-year-old girl walked up to me with beaming eyes, beaming smile and said “HELLO” and it was the kindest, warming greeting. Her family, mom and dad and little bro, hung with smiles in the background, and we all talked in google-assisted fragments of English, Turkish, “one second”/type type type/moments… I felt them seeing me and it was one of many generous moments here. In the span of these few short days, I’ve felt the weightless floating of suddenly having a very different life, and it makes me feel that very human sensitivity to kindness and generosity of warmth, of interest. I’m having a great time and, simultaneously, I feel the rug ripped out from underneath me, all designed by a sort of heartless past-me (the me in the past likes to make appointments too early in the morning, likes to quadruple book my Sundays, and doesn’t find anything scary… she’s all idealism and everything’s-possible and we’re-going-to-the-moon-at-noon) (now, cut to me going to the actual excavation site and I’m anxious about how I’ll be received, how real my project actually is, how the newness will feel there, no two ways. And I’m expectant and excited and ready… it’s all real emotions and experiences, all things my past-me just doesn’t really consider much). Have you ripped the rug out from underneath your life ever or recently, directly or indirectly? How would you do it? This time here feels very important and much muddier and messy and real than I’d imagined while I told everybody ever about this plan for the past year. Just walking through the open doors, into the open walkways. I can deal with the heat, though I have to keep my act together—- the heat makes any of us forget to eat and then, like today, I can have a slight/brief/it was totally fine blood sugar meltdown where I had to sit on a bench and drink water and distract myself by taking notes. Still, like Looney Tunes, all I could see walking by me were life-size protein bars. Intrusive protein bar thoughts. I went back to the terrace on the hilll, above the sacred koi pond, for some chicken kebab dinner. Eating by yourself is so weird, we just make it okay in America. Love the servers, lot of them are in college and it’s been sweet talking with them…people are studying to become doctors, nurses… archaeologists.

The dust here gets in my eyes and I hear August is hotter than September, which is great news, because it is as hot as I think it should ever get.

Oh, the Perseid Meteor Shower is happening tonight and then next 3 more nights. We can see that in Türkiye, right? I can’t wait!

I stood in the mosaic museum all by myself for over an hour. It did feel like a private tour, intimate, like the mosaic pieces were showing me their extra sides. My mom mused that maybe I had been one of those Amazonians depicted in the mosaics, because, according to her and a certain number of other people, I have nice broad shoulders. I think they’re pretty normal.

The Necropolis called me in at the hottest part of the day and felt important to see but/and I’m mostly sure I don’t need to be in that burial space much more. Caves and caves and caves in this part of the world.

Sanliurfa is a really special place. Here are some words and phrases for how it feels to me: peaceful, layers of time, lot of public spaces, holy koi fish, water running through desert, historical handsome buildings, giant plazas, spacious, glass-blowingly hot, tourism that’s a lot of Turkish folks (I’ve found in a completely air-tight census in broken Turkish-English exchanges), a town that’s a nexus of people, a meeting place, lot of money/little bit of money, nighttime bustling with families, a living place housing a lot of deceased and past and simultaneous. Now, I did go to the supermarket and, at the risk of sounding very unfair the whole walk there and back and the inside of it was bleak. We reserve space for a certain kind of industrial bleakness in every human place on earth. Or we guarantee it, with all the industrial demands. Okay, okay. Okay. I peeped into a construction site surrounded by barbed wire and metal fencing and it looked like a crater was taken out of building structures that were easily 500 years old, at least. So we’re working with a certain kind of quality here, in the midst of the dusty concrete slabs of new structures. I passed by a Roman-era aqueduct on my way, on this supposedly bleak walk. I can’t be pleased! But, truly, I’m grateful and full of life and skips in my step. I’ll drink enough water and try to be easy on myself, with all the newness, and I hope you’ll drink enough water and easy on yourself, with all the newness. We have a lot coming at us! My mission for this week: pour any doubt into the water and be alive to where I am. Ready to go to Göbekli Tepe.

Getting ready to go to göbekli (tepe)

Dear all,

Thank you for your interest in my travels and work, and thank you to many of you for your support of my research fund. I'm getting my bags packed- lots of piles of archaeological-site-friendly, sun-covering-up, rough-and-tumble clothes and hats and gear. The internet is, as we know, a vast quagmire of suggestions and advice for packing, and I’ve somehow found whole lady-archaeologist blogs and posts that urge new-to-excavation-site-visitors to bring flexible, sturdy, breathable clothes. I’m amassing a small and hopefully functional pile of clothes I can get very dusty and dirty, with the basic and overall goal of appearing like I basically know what I’m doing and signaling to all that I won’t be a nightmare guest at the site. It’s good to be a good guest!

I’m currently docked at my parents’ house in Salt Lake City, rifling through my supplies and taking care of last pieces of preparations… I’m thinking about what it’ll be like to arrive to the Göbekli Tepe and how I’ll ask around and find the folks in charge, the excavation team, and see where they stay and where I’ll set my bags down— excited and apprehensive about all the unknowns! I’ve decided that a roller bag is too pedestrian-looking and have opted for a duffle bag backpack that says “I do archaeology all the time.” Or, I hope it says that.

I’m flying from SLC to Istanbul this Sunday, Aug.4, stopping of in Paris (can I say I was in Paris for the Olympics??), then staying at a little bed and breakfast in the historic Sultanahmet neighborhood, overlooking the Bosphorous, for a couple days. Then I’ll fly on Aug. 7 to Şanlıurfa, the town right outside of Göbekli Tepe, and hop a shuttle or some form of transportation (many roads lead to the site, so I hear!) and arrive, finally, at my destination. It’s hard to believe I’ll be there so soon from now! Time to get on with it, don’t you think? I feel like I’ve been planning and talking everybody’s ear off about this trip for eons.

I’m also pouring over the ever-updating journals and publications on GT and its related sites, now with a little time to soak up the newer publications and novelties. I have a sense that no matter what I read or look at or listen to, the actuality of being on-site and talking with people who are studying it (some for many, many years!) will supersede everything in a beautiful way. I’m going there because you really have to be there, inhabiting the place, to feel into the mythological aspects. The human and the in-this-world aspects. If you're interested in a great source of compiled research, theories, images and updates, the German Archaeological Institute (excavation partners with Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism) has a great blog that posts regular updates and images from the site: https://www.dainst.blog/the-tepe-telegrams/the-research-project/. In my planning talks with the site director, I was excited to hear that the excavation team regularly visits surrounding sites, such as Karahan Tepe and (long shot!) maybe even the newer excavation site of Boncuklu Tarla in Mardin, Turkey (began in 2012), which has structures similar in style to Göbekli Tepe but is over 1000 years older!

I'm sharing some sources below on these satellite sites (just a couple, as there are so many!):

• Karahan Tepe: https://journals.uni-lj.si/DocumentaPraehistorica/article/view/38.19/1651

• Boncuklu Tarla: https://www.aa.com.tr/en/culture/ancient-site-older-than-gobeklitepe-unearthed-in-turkey/1664156)

I'll be posting updates here, of course, as well as on instagram:

• my main instagram: @charlotteclairemo

• my trip-specific instagram: @goingtogobeklitepe

Thank you so much for your support and generosity, everyone. Your words of encouragement, your contributions, your care… all of it has helped me feel so ready for this journey!

Many thanks and more soon,

Charlotte