Direkli Cave | Unexpected Discovery at Younger Dryas Cave

Direkli Cave in southern Turkey is an ancient site many people may never have heard of, but its important in our understanding of life in Anatolia before Gobekli Tepe.

At the site, what is called layer 7 dates back to at least 12,730 years go with layers 3-5 dating back to 12,500 to 11,000 years ago.So, this is a Younger Dryas site, when conditions in Anatolia were relatively cold and arid.


But what was life like in the 1,000 years before Gobekli Tepe? What did people eat and how did they live?As well as evidence of the human diet, archaeologists found a surprise at Direkli Cave - a 12,730-year-old baked clay figurine, a technological innovation that shows controlled use of fire, something that was never expected in pre-Neolithic Anatolia/Turkey.


Watch this video to learn more about life in Ancient Anatolia during the Younger Dryas, in the years before the foundations were laid at Gobekli Tepe.


All images are taken from Google Images and the below sources for educational purposes only.

Matt Sibson
544K subscribers