“These are the pathway of proto-Indo-European or P.I.E. language development. The Kurgan hypothesis suggests that P.I.E. first started in the Pontic-Caspian steppes here above the Black Sea. Alternatively, the Anatolian hypothesis suggests it started within our oral tradition origination area.  And this is why we believe the originators of the tradition may have spread their language, farming, and the oral traditions from Crimea to Anatolia. And most importantly, they may have started the first large-scale organized religion at Gobekli Tepe. This site may very well be where mankind first truly communed with God. Our object may have allowed them to communicate with God.”

Father Jean-Paul Sobiros, May 2021

Who Were the Proto Indo Europeans And What Does It Matter Anyways?

What do Bengali, English, French, German, Hungarian, Punjabi, Russian, Spanish and Turkish all have in common?  They are linguistically derived from one common language hypothesized spoken by an Indo-European originating people.  This phenomenon was documented as early as the 16^th century when Jesuit priest in Goa noted the similarities between the languages in India and Greek and Latin.

46% of the world’s population speaks an Indo- European language.  Another sign that the world has more commonalities than difference when you trace back culture and norms to ancient roots.

Were the Steppes North of the Black and Caspian Seas the Origin of the Proto-Indo-Europeans?

The Kurgan Hypothesis of 1956 proposes the Proto-Indo-Europeans arose from a nomadic group, the Yamna, in the steppes north of the Black and Caspian Seas as early as the 6^th century BCE.   They were the earliest of the Kurgan (burial mound) cultures which lasted for two thousand years with offshoots spreading to the Danube valley and Anatolia.  Linguistic and genetic evidence best supports this hypothesis.

The spread of their culture and language is attributed to their use of horses and later the chariot with implication that their expansions may have been less than peaceful.

But did It All Start in Anatolia (Southern Turkey)?

Some experts believe these languages came from a Proto-Indo European people who lived in the Neolithic era.   The Anatolian Hypothesis of 1987 proposed that a Pre-Proto-Indo-European civilization arose in Anatolia as early as 8000 BCE with the origination of domestic agriculture.  A more peaceful population expansion spreading the knowledge of agriculture occurred over the next several thousand years.

Other experts refute this hypothesis pointing to tool development and linguistic evidence suggesting the Proto Indo Europeans existed thousands of years later than the Anatolian hypothesis.

The Matriarch Matrix – A tale that started with the tail of the bird star

The story of the Orzu and Nanshe, a trepid couple from 9600 BCE, the two hypotheses are blended.  Their ancestors come from lands somewhere north of the Black Sea, or the Big Lake as they knew it.  Chased by a monstrous warrior race, they flee from the woods and farming lands on the banks of the Big Lake across to the “Other Side” where Anatolia exists today.  They bring their rich language with them and teach this language to the people they meet.  For with richness of language comes the ability to find commonalities that can lead to peaceful co-existence.

 “Then comes the barter. Orzu and Nanshe have come to learn the language of the Other Siders. Their own language is richer and more descriptive, which helps them conceptualize how to negotiate win-wins, even in the Other Siders’ language. Orzu wants more than the normal amount of the black stones, which the Other Siders call obsidian. They offer twice the amount for half the shark. Nanshe sheds her perfect demure hostess mask and demands they tell her where this obsidian comes from as well as give them all the stones they have on the boat in exchange for two-thirds of the shark.

Reluctantly, they tell her and Orzu. The town that trades these stones is nearly a day’s sail from their location to the shore on their side, and another day’s sail along the coastline to the left. They come from a mountain further inland, about half a moon cycle by foot over three mountain ranges. One of the men draws a map on the floor of their boat. They conclude with Nanshe grinning at Orzu because she got them the best part of the deal. Once in their boat, the Other Siders hug each other, thinking that they got the best part of the deal.” 

 

 

“And most importantly, they may have started the first large-scale organized religion. This site may very well be where mankind first truly communed with God. Our object may have allowed them to communicate with God.”         – Father Jean-Paul Sobiros, May 2021

 

The World’s Oldest Temple?

Nearly 12,000 years ago, hunter-gathers in the lands know known as Turkey built what is said by some – “the world’s oldest temple”.

Pork Belly Hill, more commonly known as Göbekli Tepe in Turkish, was but a mere mound of 15 meters height and 300 meters in diameter resting upon a mountain range 15 kilometers northeast of the city of Sanliurfa, the birthplace of the Prophet Abraham.  For ten millennia, this mound rested non-descript.  Barren.  Desolate.  A grazing point for goats with a sole mulberry tree among a field of covered granite stones.

 

 

In 1963, a survey by American archaeologist Peter Benedict, University of Chicago, led to this area being classified as a Neolithic site covered by Byzantine and Islamic cemeteries.  There were many stones buried in the ground which they deemed as grave markers.

Then in the summer of 1994, a Kurdish shepherd, Savak Yiziz, tending to his flock of sheep discovered a series of large oblong stones mostly buried in the ground atop the arid hillside.  He reported this important finding to the museum in Sanliurfa.  After the museum contacted the German Archaeological Institute, archaeologist Professor Klaus Schmidt began investigating the mound in late 1994.

Monoliths

Professor Klaus recognized the oblong stones spotted by the Kurdish shepherd as the tops of monolithic T-shaped pillars similar to those he documented at another Pre-Pottery Neolithic site nearby – Nevalı Çori.  In 1995, he and five others began excavation of the site leading to the discovery of four circular enclosures with up to a dozen large T-shaped pillars within.  The largest of these pillars stands 5.5 meters tall (18 feet) and estimated to weight as much as 50 tons.  The earliest enclosure was dated to around 9600 BCE.  Over the next 20 years, twenty enclosures have been identified.

Noah’s Ark?

Engraved on these monoliths is a veritable menagerie of animals or as Klaus Schmidt said, “stone age zoo”.  Aurochs, bears, boars, ducks, flamingos, foxes, gazelles, insects, reptiles (four legged), scorpions, snakes, wildcats, vultures.  For the most part, the animals depicted represented the more dangerous animals of the time of the enclosures’ builders.  Goats and sheep, which were also present in this area during this age, are conspicuously absent.  Some authors have speculated whether or not the diversity of animals represented, some of which are not native to this area, ties back to the legendary tale of Noah and his assemblage of animals.  Was this temple a re-telling of that story?

Why Would Hunter-Gathers’ Build Such A Monument?

“These people were foragers, people who gathered plants and hunted wild animals. Our picture of foragers was always just small, mobile groups, a few dozen people. They cannot make big permanent structures, we thought, because they must move around to follow the resources. They can’t maintain a separate class of priests and craft workers, because they can’t carry around all the extra supplies to feed them. Then here is Göbekli Tepe, and they obviously did that.”  – Professor Klaus Schmidt

The stones at Stonehenge are half the size and 6,000 years younger.  The great pyramids at Giza would not be built for another 7,000 years.

Around 9600 BCE, mankind was emerging from the last ice age represented by small bands of hunter-gathers.  Experts estimate building the first enclosure would have required fifty to a hundred people working together for nearly a year. How could small nomadic tribes have collaborated to build this monument?    Why would a group of hunter-gathers collaborate on such an endeavor that is not related to shelter, food acquisition, or safety?

Archaeologists did not find evidence of domestic homes at Gobekli Tepe.  Nor sources of water, nor agricultural crops.  The builders of this monument must have lived in the valleys below the hills, ten to twenty kilometers away.  Professor Schmidt hypothesized the animal carvings were guardians of the spiritual world.  They concluded that this must have been a sanctuary.  Others have called evidence of the first large scale organized religion.

“An answer to the question ‘Who are the T-Shapes?’ may be a little easier when these non-stylized statues are taken into account. The more or less naturalistically depicted statues seem to represent members of our world, powerful and important, but inferior to the T-Shapes, who remain in mysterious, faceless anonymity. The T-Shapes seem to belong to the other world; the non-stylized statues seem to have the role of guardians of the sacred sphere.”  – Professor Klaus Schmidt

Later researchers found the principle monoliths are aligned to astrological positions.  In particular, the tops of the main T-pillars point to the historic position of the polar North Star, which at 10,000 BCE would have been the star Deneb in the Cygnus constellation – “the tail of the bird star”.

Some speculate whether or not this alignment related to the postulated the cataclysmic impact of an extraterrestrial object across the northern hemisphere which lead to the last ice age.  Were these northern astrological alignments part of the lore mankind passed through the ages to document this destructive life altering event?

“Beings from another world.”  – Professor Klaus Schmidt

The Foundation of Agriculture and Organized Religion

In several Pre-Pottery Neolithic sites tens of kilometers from Gobekli Tepe, archaeologists have found evidence of early agriculture.  Is it only a coincidence that Gobekli Tepe lies at the northern most part of the “Fertile Crescent”?

Did Gobekli Tepe represent the outcome of the domestication of agriculture?   Mankind settles in communities.  Mankind has wealth of food supplies.  And mankind now has time to think about high order thoughts such as spirituality.  And hence, did these new farmers create the monument at Gobekli Tepe to worship together?

But researchers believe that the builders of this sanctuary were hunter-gathers, likely based on the spearhead and arrowheads found in the area.  So were these nomads somehow inspired to build a common place of worship and then communities evolve as a result of this inspiration?  And from where, from whom, did this inspiration come from?

And Then It Was Buried

Around fifteen-hundred years after its creation, the structures at Gobekli Tepe were mysteriously buried.  Researchers have concluded this was an active process of burying as opposed to a gradual process of decay over millennia. The last remaining enclosures were covered with earth brought in from other areas, stone chips, and refuse materials.  And the mound, the Tell, the Tepe, was left to sit undisturbed for the next ten thousand years.

The Matriarch Matrix – Inception of the novel premise

A few years ago, I first learned of this amazing archaeologic site and the proposition of it as the earliest site of large scale organized religion.  I was fascinated by the idea of an organized religion in the days before man could write.  How would they pass down their wisdom, their beliefs, to the next generations?  And what happened to these creators?

Thinking about the Navaho, who pass down their traditions by word of mouth from generation to generation, I postulated that the creators’ of Gobekli Tepe passed along their culture, their beliefs, their religion, from generation to generation in an oral tradition like the Navahos.  And thus, in the modern times, some semblance of their influence must still exist.  And thus was born the speculative fiction story – The Matriach Matrix.  The search across time for inner peace, family peace, and world peace.

 “Jean-Paul, the parchment. It’s the answer,” Peter yells, leaping out of Zara’s poor battered truck. “Look again. The H’s, they’re the same ones we saw all over Göbekli Tepe. An H just like the one above the giant with Zara’s pendant, two people holding hands. I saw this woman in my dream last night. She prayed at the object, surrounded by wild boar.”   – Peter Gollinger, May 2021

 

Further Reading:

Actual Archaeology: UNDERSTANDING GOBEKLI TEPE, Publisher: iBoo (May 31, 2016)

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Gobekli Tepe: Genesis of the Gods: The Temple of the Watchers and the Discovery of Eden, Andrew Collins author, Bear & Company; 1 edition (May 1, 2014)

www.andrewcollins.com/page/articles/Go_Tep_launch.htm

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