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Excavations at Hacılar, First Preliminary Report

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

James Mellaart
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Extract

The village of Hacilar is situated in the Vilayet of Burdur in South-west Anatolia, about 25 km. west of Burdur itself on the main road to Yeşilova and Denizli. The chalcolithic site lies about 1·5 km. west of the village and just beyond the orchards, which are irrigated by a plentiful spring at the foot of a great limestone crag which overlooks the village. It is this spring which since neolithic times has been the main reason for more or less continuous occupation in this region. Apart from the neolithic and early chalcolithic site at Hacılar there is a large Early Bronze Age mound on the northern outskirts and a classical site to the south-west of the village.

The prehistoric site is an inconspicuous mound, about 150 metres in diameter, rising to a height of not more than 1·50 m. above the level of the surrounding fields (Fig. 1 and Pl. XXIXa). The entire surface of the mound is under cultivation and a series of depressions show the holes made by a local antique-dealer in search of painted pots and small objects. About 1 km. west of the site runs the Koca Çay, the ancient Lysis, and on the eastern scarp of this river valley lies the cemetery of the Early Bronze Age settlement. Not a single burial has yet been found in the chalcolithic or neolithic levels of our site and it is therefore not unreasonable to suggest that its cemetery also may eventually be located there.

Type
Research Article
Information
Anatolian Studies , Volume 8 , December 1958 , pp. 127 - 156
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute at Ankara 1958

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References

1 I have since traced about half a dozen complete pots, painted in the Hacılar I style, one sitting headless figurine, three clay heads of figurines (Fig. 11: 1, 2, 4), two stamp-seals, a clay “altar”, about a dozen stone axes, celts, polishers, a small stone bowl, complete and supported by three feet, found in House B II and stolen from the excavations and about a dozen fragmentary plain pots and painted sherds into a private collection in Istanbul, the owner of which kindly gave me permission to publish them.

2 Also ransacked by the peasants, and said to consist of pithos graves. About a dozen red-brown or greyish-black burnished vessels; beak-spouted jugs, miniature vessels of the same shape, Kusura cups, all decorated with grooved ornament and white-filled incised miniature jars. This pottery closely corresponds to that of Beycesultan XVI and XV, approximately contemporary with the late Troy I and the early Troy II period. It is unpublished and in the same private collection in Istanbul. Two bronze pins, obtained from the local antique dealer for recording, belong to a later phase of the Early Bronze Age. These will be published by Mr. D. Stronach.

3 AS. IV, 1954, p. 180, map 2Google Scholar.

4 The survey which led to the discovery of Hacılar was made possible through a research grant from the Central Research Fund of the University of London.

5 There were not less than six of them in house A 11/2, and at least four in each of the other two houses of the complex.

6 Neugebauer, R., and Örendi, J.Handbuch der Orientalischen Teppichkunde (Leipzig, 1909), Motifblatt I–VI, VIII–IXGoogle Scholar.

7 Hüyük, Tefenni, Hüyük, Hasan Paşa, AS. IV, 1954, pp. 181 f.Google Scholar, figs. 55, 56.

8 AS. IV, 1954, fig. 60Google Scholar.

9 Material found during the survey referred to in note 4. Still unpublished and in the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara.

10 Germania 34 (1956), p. 208 ff.Google Scholar, and The Times, 10th December, 1956.

11 Pottery of this type was also found at Çaykenari Hüyük II, north-east of Korkuteli (AS. IV, 1954, p. 184, figs. 57 and 58Google Scholar). It is tempting to see in these bowls with pattern on the inside the prototypes of the pattern-burnished wares of Besikatepe, Kumtepe Ia and Tigani in western Anatolia and of Tarsus in Cilicia, but at least a millennium seems to separate these two classes of pottery, and nothing has yet been found in western Anatolia to fill this gap.

12 Bought from the Hacılar dealer after the end of the excavations.

13 PPS. XXII, 1956, fig. 13Google Scholar, 1. Note the same incised line to show the hair and the bun at the back. The red on white sherd, fig. 13, 3, is of normal Hacılar type and the handle, no. 2, also has parallels there. A second head from the same cave (Pl. XXI, 22) is unlike ours and shows a mouth, which seems never to have been indicated in Hacılar type figurines.

14 AS. VI, 1956Google Scholar, Plate XIIb. For “limestone” read marble.

15 The same motif is very common on Apulian neolithic painted pottery, in the Serra Alto style. It is also found at Lipari. Brea, L. Bernabó and Cavalier, M.. Civiltà preistoriche delle Isole Eolie e del territorio di Milazio (Rome, 1956), fig. 13Google Scholar: i, k, and fig. 14, below.

16 Now in the private collection in Istanbul. See note 1.

17 AS. IV, 1954, p. 180 ff.Google Scholar, map 2.

18 PPS. XXII, 1956, fig. 13, 1–3, p. 197Google Scholar under (b) red-on-white ware.

19 Annuario VIII–IX, 235 ffGoogle Scholar. PPS. XXII, 1956, p. 193Google Scholar.

20 Information kindly supplied by Prof. F. Schachermeyr.

21 Antiquity XXVII, 1954, pp. 214–220Google Scholar. For “Hassuna” read Mersin Early Chalcolithic.

22 AS. IV, 1954, pp. 181, 186Google Scholar, and figs. 1–25. The new material, not yet published, is in the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara.

23 ibid., figs. 1, 4, 14, 15, 17–20.

24 ibid., figs. 21, 22.

25 ibid., figs. 9–11.

26 ibid., figs. 5–7.

27 BSA. XIX, 1912–1913, p. 48 f.Google Scholar, figs. I A and IB.

28 AS. IV, 1954Google Scholar, figs. 83–86 (clay), PZ. XXXIV–V, fig. 1 (stone).

29 AS. IV, 1954, figs. 87, 89Google Scholar.

30 See my forthcoming article on “The Neolithic obsidian industry at Ilıcapınar” in Istanbuler Mittheilungen, 1958 (?).

31 J. Garstang, Prehistoric Mersin, fig. 11, 7.

32 ibid., p. 39, fig. 20, 20 and 27.

33 ibid., fig. 20, 12, 13.

34 ibid., fig. 20, 14.

35 ibid., figs. 36 (and see later E. Chalcolithic sherds, figs. 52, 53).

36 ibid., fig. 53, 7.

37 JNES. IV, 1945Google Scholar, fig. 1, 4 and 6 (Hassuna). Note also the face on ajar, ibid., fig. 1, 2. Cf. Hacılar II sherd with figure in relief. Du Mesnil de Buisson, Baghouz, Pl. XXI, A, C–E, XXII, 1–3, XXVI, etc.

37a See Science, 20/6, 1958, p. 1426Google Scholar, for new C.14 dates from Mersin and Hassuna.

38 Schachermeyr, F., “Die Vorderasiatische Kulturtrift,” Saeculum, V, 1953, p. 268 ff.Google Scholar, and Schachermeyr, F., Die Ältesten Kulturen Griechenlands (Stuttgart, 1955), p. 49 ffGoogle Scholar.

39 Prehistoric Thessaly, p. 115, fig. 64. AA. 1955, p. 157Google Scholar, fig. 1.

40 AA. 1955, p. 168Google Scholar.

41 AA. 1955, p. 180, 7Google Scholar.

42 Prehistoric Thessaly, passim. See under Tsangli, Zerelia and especially Sesklo with references to Tsountas, C., Ai Proistorikai Akropoleis Diminiou kai Sesklou (Athens, 1908)Google Scholar. Oval vessels: recently recognised in Thessaly by Dr. D. Theochares.

43 Prehistoric Thessaly, fig. 83, h–o, 84.

44 ibid., fig. 97, r.

45 ibid., fig. 45 (interior), 46, n. Heurtley, , Prehistoric Macedonia, p. 137, no. 6Google Scholar.

46 Saeculum V, 3, p. 291, no. 12, 14Google Scholar. PPS. XXII, 1956, Pl. XXI, no. 11Google Scholar.

47 Ath. Mit. 68, 1953Google Scholar, figs. 17–19.

48 Tsountas, op. cit., fig. 86–88.

49 ibid., figs. 270–3.

50 Prehistoric Thessaly, fig. 93.

51 Tsountas, op. cit., fig. 287.

52 Tsountas, op, cit., pl. 32–4; fig. 224–9. Ältesten Kulturen Griechenlands, Pl. II.

53 Hesperia XXVI, 1957Google Scholar, pl. 49a. ILN. 12/1/1957.

54 Ath. Mit. 57, 1932, pl. 22, p. 107Google Scholar, fig. 1.

55 Ältesten Kulturen Griechenlands, pl. 3.

56 Tsountas, op. cit., fig. 243. There is one like that in the much mentioned private collection from Hacılar.

57 Tsountas, op. cit., pl. 39, 40; figs. 231–9, 256–61.

57a ibid., figs. 292–3.

58 ibid., figs. 252–3.

59 ibid., figs. 246–50.

60 ibid., figs. 274–5.

61 Hesperia, XXVI, pl. 49, c.

62 Prehistoric Thessaly, p. 172, fig. 119.

63 ibid., fig. 84.

64 ibid., fig. 40, g. Ältesten Kulturen Griechenlands, fig. 12, 2 (Corinth).

65 Weinberg, S. S. in AJA. 55, 1951, plates 1, 2Google Scholar.

66 AA. 1955, p. 184 ffGoogle Scholar. BCH. LXXXI, 1957, p. 593–6Google Scholar. These are after Sesklo: (1) Central Greek Phase, (2) Dimini, (3) Arapi, (4) Gremnos, (5) Larisa, Rakhmani, the latter contemporary with E.H. 1 further south.

67 AA. 1955, pp. 172–8 and 179–180Google Scholar (resumé), and BCH. in previous footnote.