Çatalhöyük (English: Chatalhoyuk; , ; ; also Çatal Höyük and Çatal Hüyük; from Turkish çatal "fork" + höyük "tumulus") is a tell (a mounded accretion resulting from long-term human settlement) of a very large Neolithic and Chalcolithic proto-city settlement in southern Anatolia, which existed from around 7500 BC to 5600 BC and flourished around 7000 BC. Çatalhöyük overlooks the Konya Plain, southeast of the present-day city of Konya (ancient Iconium) in Turkey, around from the twin-coned volcano of Mount Hasan. It is notable for its large size, apparent egalitarian social structure, and value as a well-preserved example of early Neolithic-era permanent human settlements.In July 2012, it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Archaeology The site of Çatalhöyük consists of two mounds separated by an extinct channel of the Çarşamba River. Eastern Mound - about in area with a height of about . Its initial occupation in the Neolithic period resulted in a thick layer of remains whose extent is uncertain due to overlying later remains. Abandoned after the Neolithic, aside from a few stray Bronze Age graves, it was later occupied in the Phrygian, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman periods. Well-built structures were built at the top of the mound in the Hellenistic period. A fort was built there in the Roman period, and a number of Byzantine coins were found. Western Mound - about in diameter (covering an area of about ) with a height of about , lying about to the west. It was occupied in the Early Chalcolithic period, beginning around 5600 BC. The original excavator used a periodisation of 12 levels, numbered 1–12. The current excavator replaced this with a different alphabetic schema involving levels A-Z.
The site was discovered by James Mellaart in 1958 during a regional survey of the Konya Plain. He led a team which excavated there for four seasons between 1961 and 1965. These excavations revealed this section of Anatolia as a centre of advanced culture in the Neolithic period. Excavation revealed 18 successive layers of buildings signifying various stages of the settlement and eras of history. It has been strongly suggested that a number of the purported wall paintings and drawings of lost figurines, many which have been use in other publications, were actually fabricated by Mellaart.
Mellaart was banned from Turkey for his involvement in the Dorak affair, in which he published drawings of supposedly important Bronze Age artifacts that later went missing. After this scandal, the site lay idle until 1993, when excavations began under the leadership of British Ian Hodder, then at the University of Cambridge. The Hodder-led excavations ended in 2018. The first two seasons of work were surface surveys with excavation beginning in 1995. Hodder, a former student of Mellaart, chose the site as the first "real world" test of his controversial theory of post-processual archaeology. The site has always had a strong research emphasis upon engagement with digital methodologies, driven by the project's experimental and reflexive methodological framework. According to Mickel, Hodder's Çatalhöyük Research Project (ÇRP) established itself as a site for progressive methodologiesin terms of adaptable and democratised recording, integration of computerised technologies, sampling strategies, and community involvement."
At the Western Mound, upon which Mellaart had only opened two trenches, in 1961, Jonathan Last and Catriona Gibson excavated in 1998. In 2006, two teams began work in the West Mound, one under the direction of Burçin Erdoğu and the other under the direction of Peter Biehl and Eva Rosenstock. Excavations continue under the direction of Ali Umut Türkcan from Anadolu University.
In August 2025, archaeologists led by Arkadiusz Marciniak of Poznań University revealed a mortuary structure referred to as the "House of the Dead" or "Spiritual House". The team uncovered a building where the remains of 20 individuals were placed beneath the floor, suggesting a ritual use. The discovery also included a large ceremonial structure adorned with painted walls and supported by fourteen platforms, as well as a smaller, plastered structure.
Finds at the site, from the Neolithic layers, included a number of textiles which are rarely preserved in early sites. Most were found in a burial context, often burnt, and all fragments. A number of lithics, almost all of obsidian, were found in those levels with the most numerous types being blades, flakes, projectile points, scrapers, daggers, and sickle blades. A number of Neolithic skeletons were also recovered, many from intramural inhumations and in many cases, secondary burials. Over 2,500 "casually baked" Neolithic clay figurines have been found, mostly animal but including 187 human.
Culture
Çatalhöyük was composed entirely of domestic buildings with no obvious public buildings. While some of the larger rooms have rather ornate murals, the purpose of others remains unclear.
Initial estimates suggested an average population of between 5,000 and 7,000. However, more recent work using revised ideas of the distribution of residential buildings, and employing archaeological and ethnographic data exploring building use, suggests that between 600 and 800 people would have lived at Çatalhöyük East during an average year during the Middle phase (6700–6500 BC). Genetic studies published during 2025 indicate that the social organisation began with a culture organised along matrilocality and matrilineality and that the households passed from mother to daughter.
The sites were set up as large numbers of buildings clustered together. Households looked to their neighbours for help, trade, and possible marriage for their children. The inhabitants lived in mudbrick houses that were crammed together in an aggregate structure. No footpaths or streets were used between the dwellings, which were clustered in a honeycomb-like maze. Most were accessed by holes in the ceiling and doors on the side of the houses, with doors reached by ladders and stairs. The rooftops were effectively streets. The ceiling openings also served as the only source of ventilation, allowing smoke from the houses' open hearths and ovens to escape.
Houses had plaster interiors accessed by squared-off timber ladders or steep stairs. These were usually on the south wall of the room, as were cooking hearths and ovens. The main rooms contained raised platforms that may have been used for a range of domestic activities. Typical houses contained two rooms for everyday activity, such as cooking and crafting. All interior walls and platforms were plastered to a smooth finish. Ancillary rooms were used as storage, and were accessed through low openings from main rooms.
All rooms were kept scrupulously clean. Archaeologists identified very little rubbish in the buildings, finding middens outside the ruins, with sewage and food waste, as well as significant amounts of ash from burning wood, reeds, and animal dung. In good weather, many daily activities may also have taken place on the rooftops, which may have formed a plaza. In later periods, large communal ovens appear to have been built on these rooftops. Over time, houses were renewed by partial demolition and rebuilding on a foundation of rubble, which was how the mound was gradually built up. As many as eighteen levels of settlement have been uncovered.
As a part of ritual life, the people of Çatalhöyük buried their dead within the village. Human remains have been found in pits beneath the floors and especially beneath hearths, the platforms within the main rooms, and beds. Early burials feature closely related families, but burials later in the site's history feature more unrelated individuals, suggesting a change over time in the structure of households. Bodies were tightly flexed before burial and were often placed in baskets or wound and wrapped in reed mats. Disarticulated bones in some graves suggest that bodies may have been exposed in the open air for a time before the bones were gathered and buried. In some cases, graves were disturbed, and the individual's head removed from the skeleton. These heads may have been used in rituals, as some were found in other areas of the community. In a woman's grave, spinning whorls were recovered and in a man's grave, stone axes. Some skulls were plastered and painted with ochre to recreate faces, a custom more characteristic of Neolithic sites in Syria and Jericho than of sites closer by. A sex-based divide was apparent in burial painting. Male bodies were decorated with cinnabar, and female bodies were associated with azurite and malachite pigment.
Vivid murals and figurines are found throughout the settlement on interior and exterior walls. Distinctive clay figurines of women, notably the Seated Woman of Çatalhöyük, have been found in the upper levels of the site. Although no identifiable temples have been found, the graves, murals, and figurines suggest that the people of Çatalhöyük had a religion rich in symbols. Rooms with concentrations of these items may have been shrines or public meeting areas. Predominant images include men with erect phalluses, hunting scenes, red images of the now extinct aurochs (wild cattle) and stags, and vultures swooping down on headless figures. Relief figures are carved on walls, such as of lionesses facing one another.
Heads of animals, especially of cattle, were mounted on walls. A painting of the village, with the twin mountain peaks of Mount Hasan in the background, Alt URL is frequently cited as the world's oldest map, and the first landscape painting. However, some archaeologists question this interpretation. Stephanie Meece, for example, argues that it is more likely a painting of a leopard skin instead of a volcano, and a decorative geometric design instead of a map.
Religion
A feature of Çatalhöyük are its female figurines. Mellaart, the original excavator, argued that these carefully made figurines, carved and moulded from marble, blue and brown limestone, schist, calcite, basalt, alabaster, and clay, represented a female deity. Although a male deity existed as well, "statues of a female deity far outnumber those of the male deity, who moreover, does not appear to be represented at all after Level VI". To date, eighteen levels have been identified. These figurines were found primarily in areas Mellaart believed to be shrines. The stately goddess seated on a throne flanked by two lionesses was found in a grain bin, which Mellaart suggests might have been a means of ensuring the harvest or protecting the food supply.Mellaart (1967), 180.
Whereas Mellaart excavated nearly two hundred buildings in four seasons, the current excavator, Ian Hodder, spent an entire season excavating one building alone. Hodder and his team, in 2004 and 2005, began to believe that the patterns suggested by Mellaart were false. They found one similar figurine, but the vast majority did not imitate the Mother Goddess style that Mellaart suggested. Instead of a Mother Goddess culture, Hodder points out that the site gives little indication of a matriarchy or patriarchy.
In an article in the Turkish Daily News, Hodder denied that Çatalhöyük was a matriarchal society, saying "When we look at what they eat and drink and at their social statues, we see that men and women had the same social status. There was a balance of power. Another example is the skulls found. If one's social status was of high importance in Çatalhöyük, the body and head were separated after death. The number of female and male skulls found during the excavations is almost equal." In another article in the Hürriyet Daily News Hodder is reported to say "We have learned that men and women were equally approached".
Hodder said in a September 2009 report on the discovery of around 2000 figurines: