EXPERIMENTS IN THE EXPERIMENTAL HOUSE
Figure 12. Using the dimensions of a Neolithic grave we dug a hole through the platform in the Experimental House. We had not accounted for how much soil would be generated.
Our experimental house continues to be a huge success and generates interest from not just visitors but the team as well. Modifications are made to the house year by year, perhaps in the same way as happened in the Neolithic period. For us all the house has presented an insight into a sense of ‘space' within a Çatalhöyük house, its use and ‘feel'. It has generated many practical and obvious questions that we as archaeologists tend to oversee, such as light source, and ventilation when an oven or hearth is lit. We have fired up the oven using both wood and dung, the latter of which was most commonly used as we know from the archaeological deposits. But our attempts at firing have proved disastrous with the smoke driving us out of the house with streaming eyes within minutes. The house is a great attraction for television and this was not the first year that it was used as a television set for a docu-drama. This year a Discovery network series wanted to re-create a burial scene for a forthcoming programme called ‘Ancient Clues'. We took the opportunity to experiment ourselves. In digging a grave pit through one of the platforms we used the dimensions of a grave pit that we had dug on site. The first lesson we learnt was that a lot of soil came out of the hole (Fig. 12). We had never considered where this soil would have been put temporarily whilst the burial took place, and the impact it might have had on the burial proceedings and secondly we had never really considered the practicalities of how much soil would have to have been taken out of the building once the body was laid in the grave. |
