11,000 years ago, sedentary hunter-gatherers worshiped in these, the oldest man-made temples in the world. Think Stonehenge is old? A greater time separates these temples from Stonehenge than separates Stonehenge from the present. This image shows a reenactment of the ancient ritual of CXC in a setting that is, I would say, appropriate.
Haha, awesome! Please educate my ignorance: isn't "sedentary hunter gatherer" a kind of oxymoron?
ReplyDeleteAh, you offer me such a great teachable moment! Many people think that farming and sedentism are tightly bound together, but that is not, in fact the case. Historical examples are the Native American communities in the Pacific Northwest, who use abundant marine resources to sustain a mostly sedentary existence. In the Middle East the Natufians as well as Pre-Pottery Neolithic A communities such as those at Gobekli Tepe, made use of the abundant resources in the so-called "hilly flanks" of the Zagros and Taurus mountains. But then, of course, one must define what what means by sedentism. Probably more than you wanted to hear, but this is what makes Gobekli Tepe *so* interesting--elaborate built structures made by peoples who were not eating domesticated varieties of plants and animals.
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