HUGE Megalithic Complex Discovered In Turkey!

[gyrtrash]

A massive complex of megaliths has been un-earthed in the mountains of Turkey.

The megalithic complex of Carnac is world-famous for the enormous scale and intricate planning of its standing stones, avenues and circles - the best-known site in the megalithic world of north-west Europe for over 3000 years (Burl 1993).
Now, a new megalithic complex has been discovered, second only to Carnac in size and importance in Europe. Set in the forested hill-country of the Istranca Mountains in Turkish Thrace, clustered around the sacred mountain of Muhittin Baba (Fig. 1), lies a group of standing stone complexes of comparable complexity and size, with the total number of individual stones reaching over 2,000 (compared to Carnac's 3,000).
The complexes were discovered so recently that there have been no excavations as yet; their date is tentatively set in the Iron Age (800 - 100 CAL BC) with continued use into the Ottoman and Recent periods.

From; http://antiquity.ac.uk/ProjGall/erdogu/erdogu.html


Second largest site in Europe? So new it's not even been excavated yet?!
I wonder if they want volunteers?

 

[Anonymous]

Carnac is an amazing place; if this Muhittin Baba site is similar it would be interesting to see.

Mind you Iron Age is much later in date than other megalithic sites, so there is not likely to be a direct cultural connection, I would have thought...

 

[EnolaGaia]

A massive complex of megaliths has been un-earthed in the mountains of Turkey.
From; http://antiquity.ac.uk/ProjGall/erdogu/erdogu.html

Original link (to the Antiquity journal site) is dead. Here's a 2004 capture of the article available at the Wayback Machine:

https://web.archive.org/web/20041014080930/http://antiquity.ac.uk/ProjGall/erdogu/erdogu.html

 

[EnolaGaia]

Here's an additional excerpt from the article to set the background ...

... The history of research into south-east European megaliths began at the end of the nineteenth century (Shkorpil 1890; Slaveikov 1891). However, the existence of standing stones was unclear until the 1960s. Standing stone complexes of Kirikköy, Hacilar and Eski Mezarlik were published by S. A. Kansu and he suggested that Turkish Thrace standing stone complexes were reminiscent of the cromlechs of Western Europe (Kansu 1969). During the survey of the Prehistory Department of Istanbul University in the 1980s, about 25 standing stone complexes were documented (Özdogan 1998). However, only one of them - Kirikköy - has been published in detail (Erdogu et. al. 2002). ...

Finding standing stone complexes and recording them was the main focus of our research. However, dolmens, rock-cut niches and cup marks on rocky outcrops were also documented. We investigated a small (8x4 km) area in the Lalapasa region of Edirne, around the villages of Hacidanisment and Vaysal. So far a total of six standing stone complexes have been recorded - Berberoglu Ayazmasi (590 surviving stones), Türbe Mezarligi (ca. 300 surviving stones), Eski Baglar Mezarligi (ca. 400 surviving stones), Çesmeüstü Mezarligi (419 surviving stones), Hacidanisment Eski Mezarlik (80 surviving stones) and Cevizlik (ca. 300 surviving stones). In this region, the most dramatic and memorable landscape feature is the Muhittin Baba Mountain. It has a rocky summit and surrounding boulder spreads, visible from a distance. All the standing stone complexes are situated around the mountain. The relationships between the mountain and standing stone complexes as well as dolmens are complex, and it seems all were symbolically linked. ...