Çatalhöyük 2002 Archive Report

ÇATALHÖYÜK 2002 ARCHIVE REPORT

The Excavation of the BACH 1 Area 2002

BACH 1 Bölgesi Kazilari 2002

Mirjana Stevanovic & Ruth Tringham

BACH (Berkeley Archaeologists at Çatalhöyük)

Team Director: Ruth Tringham

Field Directors: Mirjana Stevanovic, Ruth Tringham

Site Assistants: Meltem Agçabay (flotation), Basak Boz,, Kevin Bartoy, Bleda During, Lori Hager, Kari Jones, Kathryn Killackey (flotation), Marina Milic, John Matsunaga, Dragana Milosevic, Slobodan Mitrovic, Tatiana Stefanova.

Site Media specialists/Photographers: Michael Ashley-Lopez, Jason Quinlan

Laboratory Analysis: Meltem Agçabay (archaeobotany), Basak Boz (human remains), Libby Cowgill (human remains), Katheryn Killackey (archaeobotany), Lori Hager (human remains), Heidi Underbjerg (flaked stone), Vesna Dimitrijevic (faunal analysis), Banu Aydinoglugil (faunal analyst).

Abstract

Work commenced on 5 June 2002, and ended on 15 July 2002.
The primary aim of the season was to finish excavation of Building 3 and to continue the excavation of the small rooms known as Spaces 87,88,89.
Building 3-During the 2002 season excavation of Building 3 we completed removal of the floors and features belonging to Phase 1 of occupation down to the midden below the building. This was followed by scraping the plaster layers from the wall faces and detailed recording and description of the wall bricks and mortars.
At the beginning of the 2002 season we completed excavation of floors belonging to phases 2-3 showing that these areas had been the location of food preparation and storage throughout the building’s history. The excavation of the earliest phase of the house (Phase 1) provided evidence that house floors were renewed less frequently than in the later phases and made of different clays. Several features of Phase 1 were built directly on the underlying midden prior to the very first house floor. They comprise two ovens, the roof-entrance bench into the house in the southeast corner of Building 3, a bench that separates the roof-entrance area from the “clean” northern and eastern parts of the house, and the six posts alongside the peripheral walls. A foundation deposit of obsidian bifacial points was unearthed near the entrance-bench.
The walls and floors of Building 3 were built directly on the midden and incorporated its existing topography. After the completion of excavation of the earliest floors in Building 3, the wall plasters on all four perimeter walls were scraped revealing the surprising existence of an opening in the northern part of the East wall. It was also clear that the bricks and mortars used in the construction of the walls varied according to their height above the midden.
The excavation of Spaces 89, 88, 87-The 2002 excavation of the small spaces produced interesting results, especially on clarifying the relationship between Building 3 and the small rooms. Their excavation will be completed in 2003. Currently we consider that the three rooms were all built after the construction of Building 3 but that they were at least partially contemporary with the occupation of Building 3 and the building(s) to their south (Spaces 95 and 99).
An alternative interpretation suggests that the three small rooms (Spaces 87, 88, and 89) were originally part of a larger house(s), represented by Spaces 95 and 99, which later were divided into smaller rooms that were assigned specific functions.
The excavation of Space 87 produced a surprisingly large number (at least 9) of burials for such a small room. A beautiful two-piece bone buckle was associated with a disturbed skeleton at the top of this group. The East and South walls are both painted.

Özet

Bu sezonki çalismalarin amaci, 3 nolu yapinin kazisinin tamamlanmasi ve 87, 88 ve 89 nolu mekanlar olarak bilinen küçük odalarin kazisina devam edilmesiydi.
3 nolu Yapi-3 nolu yapinin 2002 sezonu kazisinda, yapinin birinci evresine ait olan taban ve elemanlarin binanin altinda yer alan çöp alanina kadar kaldirilmasi islemini tamamladik. Bu islemi, duvar yüzeylerinden siva katmanlarinin kazinmasi ve duvar tuglalari ile harcinin detayli bir biçimde kayit ve tasvir edilmesi izledi.
3 nolu yapinin 2002 sezonu kazisinin basinda, ikinci ve üçüncü evrelere ait tabanlarin kazisini tamamlayarak, bu alanlarin yapinin tarihi boyunca yiyecek hazirlama ve depolama alanlari olarak kullanildigini gösterdik. Evin en eski evresi olan birinci evrenin kazisi, bu evredeki tabanlarin farkli bir kilden yapildigini ve daha sonraki evrelere oranla daha seyrek olarak yenilendigini gösterdi. Birinci evrenin pek çok elemani, evin ilk tabaninin altinda bulunan çöplük alaninin direkt olarak üzerine yapilmisti. Bu elemanlar; iki adet ocak, yapinin güneydogu kösesinde bulunan çati girisine ait bir tezgah, çati girisini evin kuzey ve dogudaki “temiz” bölümlerinden ayiran bir tezgah, ve çevre duvarlarin yaninda yer alan alti adet direk idi. Giris tezgahinin yakininda ikiyüzlü obsidiyen uçlarin saklandigi bir depo alani ortaya çikarildi.
3 nolu yapinin duvar ve tabanlari çöp alaninin üzerine direkt olarak ve varolan topografyayi benimseyen bir biçimde yapilmisti. Yapinin en eski tabanlarinin kazisi tamamlandiktan sonra dört çevre duvarinin hepsinin üzerindeki sivalarin kazinmasi, dogu duvarinin kuzey bölümünde beklenmedik bir geçisin varligini ortaya çikardi. Ayrica, duvar yapiminda kullanilan tuglalarin ve harcin, duvarin çöp alani üzerindeki yüksekligine göre degistigi netlik kazandi.
89, 88 ve 87 nolu Mekanlarin Kazisi-Bu küçük mekanlarin 2002 yili kazisi, özellikle 3 nolu yapiyla olan iliskilerini belirginlestirmek açisindan ilginç sonuçlar ortaya çikardi. Bu mekanlarin kazisi 2003 yilinda tamamlanacaktir. Su an itibariyle, bu üç odanin 3 nolu yapidan daha sonra insa edildigini ancak 3 nolu yapiyla ve güneylerinde yer alan bina(lar)la (95 ve 99 nolu mekanlar) en azindan kismen eszamanli olduklarini düsünüyoruz.
Alternatif bir yorum ise bu üç küçük odanin (87, 88 ve 89 nolu mekanlar), baslangiçta 95 ve 99 nolu mekanlar tarafindan temsil edilen daha büyük bir ev(ler)in parçasi oldugu, ancak daha sonra özel islevler atfedilen küçük odalar haline getirildikleridir.
87 nolu mekanin kazisi, böyle küçük bir mekan için sasirtici sayida (en az 9) gömü ortaya çikarmistir. Burada bulunan kemikten yapilmis güzel iki parçali bir toka, gömü grubunun en üzerinde bulunan rahatsiz edilmis bir iskeletle iliskilendirilmistir. Dogu ve güney duvarlarinin her ikisi de boyalidir.

Results of the 2002 excavation season

Building 3 (Space 201)

Building 3 (dimensions 6m x 5.5m) was the main focus of the excavation of the 2002 field season. By the end of the 2001 season, five major phases (1 [earliest]-5) of occupation of Building 3 had been identified (see 2001 Archive Report). In phases 1-3, Building 3 comprised a single large open space or room (Space 201). Even in these earlier periods, however, there was some partitioning of space by a small wall in the north (F.772) and low screen wall (F.601) in the center. During the 2002 season excavation of Building 3 we completed removal of the floors and features down to the midden levels below the building. This was followed by scraping the plaster layers from the wall faces and detailed recording and description of the wall bricks and mortars.

At the end of the 2001 season, floors and packing of different phases were exposed in different areas of the Building 3. In the northern and eastern parts of the building finished at the top of floor #9 (top of phase 1) on platforms F. 162, 170, 173. In the central building floor (F. 606) we finished on the floor #15 (top of phase 1). At the same time in the western part of the building we finished at the level of the massive packing under floor #9 which, in this part of Building 3, represents the end of Phase 3. In the southwest part of Building 3 by the end of the 2001 season, we had reached floor #7, which corresponds to floor #14 (beginning of phase 2) in the central area (F. 606). In the “Kitchen” area in the south-central part of Building 3, we finished at floor #9, linked to floor #28 (top of phase 1) in the entrance area in the southeast part of the building (Features 167 and 1010).

The West Wing of Building 3

The 2002 season began with the removal in the western part of Building 3 of floors and packing that belonged to phases 3 and 2. In this area and the southern part of the building, the excavation of the floors had been carried out more slowly than that of the central and eastern parts of the building because of the complicated depositional history of the western wall as well as the presence of numerous features. During the 2002 season we excavated massive layers of packing below floor #9 and on top of floor #10 (both phase 3), in the central and southern zone (segments 2 and 3) of the western wing of Building 3, which had been exposed at the end of the 2001 season. The massive packing comprising mostly large and medium size fragments of re-deposited oven constructional materials belongs extended from the wall of the storage bins (F. 786 and 770) in the north to the wall of the white plaster basins (F. 780 and 781) in the south. Its eastern edge was created by the line of the screen wall, and its western edge was the west wall of Building 3 (F. 622). The short, shoring wall in this area (F.1000) was erected on top of this massive packing and was contemporary with floor #9 in this area of the Building 3. The wall was short-lived, existing at the end of phase 3 and probably also phase 4. Below the massive packing a solid floor # 10 was discovered.

In the center of the west wing of Building 3 (segment #2), was a group of long-lasting features – white plaster basins – that we continued to excavate in 2002. These comprise features 780 and 781, and a severely damaged basin to their north (F.782). The remains of white plaster still in situ incorporated in the southern edge of the short shoring wall (F. 1000) suggests that there was a fourth such basin in this group, which must have shared a wall with feature 780. The basins were most likely used in the food preparation and demonstrate that this location was one of the main centers of this activity in Building 3 during phases 2 and 1. It is interesting that two out of the four original basins were completely cut and removed in the subsequent phase (phase 3) of the building. These are the two basins located to the north of features 780 and 781. Their removal was linked with the digging of the cuts for posts during the construction of the screen wall and modification of the West wall of Building 3.

The Phase 2 floors (floors 8 and 9) of the southern section (segment #1) of the western wing of Building 3 were also removed along the west wall. The floors extended from the southern edge of the white basins (F. 780-781) to an earlier oven (F.785) in the southwest corner of the house. This was the later phase of the oven (Phase 2).

The 2002 excavation also focused on the platform feature 169 in the southwest corner of Building 3 and along the South wall, including the “kitchen” and the “entrance” areas of the house. Floors 7 and 8 were removed from the platform feature 169. These floors are a continuation of the same floors excavated along the west wall. With the removal of floor 8 on this platform we reached the top floors of the Phase 1 in Building 3, that is, the floor reached in other areas of Building 3. Floor 9 of feature 169 formed a continuous floor with floor 15 in the central area of the house (F. 606) and on top of the platform. The difference in the number of floor layers is partially a result of their differential definition during excavation (described in the 2000 Archive Report), but also is the result of differential construction, use and preservation of the floors in different parts of the building.

Phase 1 in Building 3 (Fig.3)

In the excavation of the Phase 1 deposits of Building 3, the following floors were removed: floors 9-11 in the north and north-east of the building (covering platforms F. 162, 173, and 170; floors 15-19 in the central area (F. 606); floors 9-13 along the west wall; and floors 10-14 in the “kitchen” area in the southern part of the building.

The excavation of the earliest phases of the house provided evidence for some interesting elements in the house construction. Firstly, the house floors in the earliest phase of the history of Building 3 seem to have been less frequently renewed than in the later phases. In addition the materials used in the construction of floors and packing - primarily plaster clays and clays - were different from those used in the later phases. Finally, the number of built-in features in the building, such as furniture and partitions, was smaller in the earliest phase, so that in the earliest phase, the house was more spacious than later.

Figure 3: Aerial photograph of Building 3 in Phase 1 (north is towards the right of the picture)

Several built-in features of Phase 1 were built directly on the midden, which underlies the entire Building 3. This would suggest that these features were erected below (and before) the very first house floor. These features comprise two ovens (Features 1011 and 778); Feature 778 was an oven that is rounded in plan view and located in the west part of the “kitchen” area, but its base was placed directly on the midden below. A more substantial oven (F. 1011) was placed in the very southwest corner of Building 3. It comprised an oven with a rim-wall that was squarish in plan view with a step-like extension at the oven mouth. The rim-wall and the oven base within it were placed directly on the midden, whereas the initial floor of the oven was close to the level of the earliest house floor that surrounded it.

In addition, the roof-entrance into the house was located in the same position, that is in the southeast corner of Building 3 from the beginning until the end of its occupation. The entrance-step or entrance-bench (F. 1010) was built directly on the midden and as such it was renovated several times and lasted until about the middle of the history of the building. In later phases, it was remodeled and incorporated into a step platform in the southeast corner (F.167).

However, a real surprise was our discovery of a door opening or large crawl-hole in the northern part of the East wall of Building 3 that dated to the early phases (1-2) of the house. This opening was blocked in the subsequent phases of the house and was defined in 2000 as F.633. There are no traces of another later opening in the walls. The opening is not preserved completely because its top portion had been truncated at the time when all the walls of Building 3 were truncated. Based on other such examples in the settlement, however, we are certain that more than a half of the original height of the opening has been preserved. Moreover, the existence of this opening explains why the northern half of the East wall could not be recorded in the original surface scraping of the North area.

Another feature that was constructed on the midden and below the first house floor is a bench (F.792) that was placed along the south edge of the platform 170. This bench feature functioned to partition space between the roof-entrance area and the “clean” parts of the house, primarily the platforms along the East and North walls of Building 3. We should note that, slightly later, in the central part of the western wing of Building 3, on the second floor of the earliest phase (sub-phase 1) a low internal wall (F 635) similarly divided a food-preparation area from the “clean” area to its north.

The posts alongside the walls (F. 774, 766, 773, 602, 168, and 750) were also dug into the ground before the laying of the earliest floor of Building 3. All these posts - except for Feature 773 – comprised the full width of tree trunks and most likely were roof-bearing. The width of Feature 773 correlated with only half a tree-trunk and could have acted either as a load-bearing post or as a decorative feature.

A foundation deposit was unearthed below the earliest floor in the southeast corner of Building 3. It was placed east of the entrance-bench and below the initial floor of the platform Feature 167. The deposit comprises two well preserved obsidian bifacial points (See Flaked Stone Archive Report 2002) in a matrix of midden soil, ash deposits and scattered animal bones.

The walls and floors of Building 3 were built directly on the midden. Most interestingly they were built on the existing topography of the midden. The only likely intervention to the midden that was made before the floor was built would have been in the area of the earliest platform (F.1008). This unusual platform was located in the northwest corner of the Building 3 and included the area of the later platform Feature 162. The platform was raised above the floor level by a packing made of the midden material. In the later house phases (2-5) the platform ceased to exist, although its eastern part which became Feature 162 has a long history in the house.

After the completion of excavation of the earliest floors in Building 3, the wall plasters on all four perimeter walls were scraped. The wall plasters on the West wall were much thinner than those on other walls because of modifications made to this wall already in the first sub-phase of Phase 1. On the second house floor (#12) a shoring wall (F. 635) was added. Since it abutted the West wall, only the wall plaster from the very earliest plastering events was found behind the shoring wall. The thickness of this plaster varied from 0.7-1 cm. contrasting with the thickness of 2 to 6 cm of the multiple layers of plasters on the other perimeter walls that had accumulated during the full length of its history. The plaster of the West wall also differed in material, being made of white clay that was much greasier than the later plasters. This gave important information on the nature of the plasters used in the earliest phase of Building 3. A similar difference was noted in the floor plasters. The plasters on the North and especially the South walls had obvious traces of soot. The plasters on the North and East walls had traces of poorly preserved paint, noted in previous Archive Reports.

The bricks and mortars used in the construction of the walls were of three different kinds, which appear in all four perimeter walls. The bricks placed directly on the midden foundation soil were made of fine sandy clay of light beige color. There are four rows of such bricks with mortars consisting essentially of the underlying midden deposit. On top of the fourth brick layer there was a mortar made of very hard lumpy clay, whose purpose most likely was to stabilize the overlying courses of bricks. These overlying courses of bricks were made of coarser sandy clay of brown color with mortars made by combining two types of clay: a hard, lumpy clay and a brown clay. The third and latest type of bricks was made of dry brown clay with mortar made of a very similar material. There are up to 13 courses of bricks preserved in the North and South walls and up to 10 courses of bricks preserved in the East and West walls. The higher parts of the walls were truncated in prehistory.

The excavation of Spaces 89, 88, 87

The excavation of the small spaces produced interesting results, especially on clarifying the relationship between Building 3 and the small rooms as well as the relationships between the rooms themselves. These conclusions are of a tentative nature and are awaiting the completion of their excavation in 2003 for their final interpretation. Currently we consider that the three rooms were all built after the construction of Building 3 but that they were at least partially contemporary with the occupation of Building 3. In addition we have concluded that the Spaces 87, 88, and 89 are at least partially contemporary with the building that is located to the south from them (Spaces 95 and 99 on the plan of the scraped North area). Thus both this building and Building 3 were built before the three rooms (spaces (87, 88, 89), which would have later been inserted into the open space between them. The question still remains why an open space was left between Building 3 and that represented by Spaces 95 and 99 rather than the more traditional method of abutting one building against another. However, we should note that this “tradition” is not definite and is currently the topic of investigation in both North and South areas.

An alternative interpretation suggests that the three small rooms (Spaces 87, 88, and 89) were originally part of a larger house(s), represented by Spaces 95 and 99, which later were divided into smaller rooms that were assigned specific functions. To our surprise the excavation of Space 87 produced numerous burials in this very small room (Fig.4).

Figure 4: Photograph of the burials in Space 87

In the fill that was accumulated on the top floor of this room there were bones of a disturbed skeleton and a two-piece bone buckle associated with it (Fig.5).

Figure 5. Photograph of the bone buckle found in Space 87

The removal of this skeleton uncovered two other burials underneath whose removal uncovered yet more burials.9 complete skeletons have been excavated so far from space 87 and a number of other scattered bones indicating the presence of more skeletons. There are at least 5 burial events recorded in the space so far (see Lori Hager and Basak Boz: Human Remains Archive Report 2002).

In Space 87 there are at least 5 floor levels visible in the sides of the burial cuts. Some floor levels consist of several thin white plaster floors and others comprise massive floors created by layers of thick plaster clay. Below the floors are massive layers of packing. In each floor there was at least one burial cut including the earliest exposed floor in which a skeleton in a basket is visible.

An important element of Space 87 is that its East and South walls are both painted. It is certain that the paint has not been applied to the latest preserved plaster. Beyond that, however, it is impossible at this point to say with which, if any, of the exposed floors the painted walls are connected, but it is likely that the painted walls go with some of the burials. It is interesting to note that the paint has been applied to white-greenish greasy clay plaster, which is the same white clay that comprises the currently exposed floor. It is also interesting to note the presence of a possible crawl-hole between Spaces 87 and 88.

Acknowledgements

We are enormously grateful to John Coker, of Hillsborough, California, USA, without whom our excavation in 2002 would not have been possible. We are also grateful to the U.C. Berkeley Archaeological Research Facility and University of California, Berkeley Undergraduate Research Apprentice program for their support.