Urfa man

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The Urfa man statue is made of sandstone and has obsidian in its sockets in the Şanlıurfa Archaeological Museum .

The Urfa Man ( Turkish Urfa Adamı and Balıklıgöl Heykeli ), also known as the statue of Balıklıgöl , is a prehistoric anthropomorphic statue that was found during construction work near the Balıklıgöl of the city of Şanlıurfa . It is dated to around 9000 BC. It is dated to the Pre-Ceramic Neolithic , which means it is at the same time as the Göbekli Tepe ( Pre-Ceramic Neolithic A / B) and Nevalı Çori ( Pre-Ceramic Neolithic B ) sites . Both places are near Sanliurfa. The statue is seen as the oldest naturalistic life-size human sculpture.

Discovery and Context

In 1993 the statue was found during road construction work in the Yeni Mahalle district north of Balıklıgöl, unfortunately the exact location was not recorded. When it was found, the statue had broken into four parts, but it is not clear whether this happened unintentionally during the construction work. In 1997 it became clear that the area of ​​the site had been inhabited since the early Neolithic.

The statue is over 180 cm tall and made of light-colored sandstone . The eyes consist of two depressions in which dark obsidian is set, but a mouth is missing. The statue is bare except for a V-shaped collar (or chain). The hands seem to clasp and cover the genitals and instead of legs or feet, the statue tapers downwards to provide a secure hold in the ground.

Before the Urfa man was found, there were statuettes from the Upper Palaeolithic such as the Lion Man (35,000 to 41,000 years old), the Venus of Dolní Věstonice (25,000 to 29,000 years old), the Venus of Willendorf (almost 30,000 years old) or the Venus of Brassempouy (21,000 years old) up to 26,000 years) known. A little younger than the Urfa man himself are statues (6700 to 6500 BC) from ʿAin Ghazal in the Levant .

A separate room is dedicated to the Urfa man in the Şanlıurfa Archaeological Museum .

Web links

Commons : Urfa-Mann  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Daniel T. Potts: A Companion to the Archeology of the Ancient Near East ( en ). John Wiley & Sons, 2012, ISBN 9781444360776 , p. 155.
  2. ^ Nicola Laneri: Defining the Sacred: Approaches to the Archeology of Religion in the Near East ( en ). Oxbow Books, 2015, ISBN 9781782976837 , p. 162.
  3. ^ A b c d Richard J. Chacon, Rubén G. Mendoza: Feast, Famine or Fighting ?: Multiple Pathways to Social Complexity ( en ). Springer, 2017, ISBN 9783319484020 , p. 120.
  4. ↑ Bahattin Çelik: An Early Neolithic Settlement in the Center of Şanlıurfa, Turkey in NEO-LITHICS 2 + 3/00 - The Newsletter of Southwest Asian Neolithic Research

Coordinates: 37 ° 9 ′ 30 ″  N , 38 ° 47 ′ 30 ″  E