Çatalhöyük Figure

This fleshy female figure, found facing frontal with felines (haha say that ten times fast) comes from one of the earliest human civilizations that developed agriculture, the Neolithic settlement of Çatalhöyük. The ruins are wonders, spanning thousands of years from 7,500-6,400 BCE, built up layer upon layer of 18 levels. Çatalhöyük gives lots of evidence about some of the world’s first farmers, and the topic that really has archaeologists debating is Earth Mother Goddesses.

I am simplifying, but overall Çatalhöyük’s remains tell a lot about women’s and men’s relative power. And this is significant — virtually all urbanized cultures that developed writing also developed patriarchies, where women’s reproductive autonomy became subjected to the will of men.

This statue, when archaeologists analyzed it in the 1960s, represented a different path. This, and other Neolithic female figurines from Eurasia, were thought by some scholars to represent worship of a general “Earth Mother Goddess,” a deity that eventually was dethroned by masculine Gods and patriarchal systems.

However, research by Ian Hodder and others argues for a much more nuanced situation. Çatalhöyük seems, especially in its earliest epoch, to have gender equality. This is measured by the wear on the teeth of men and women, which ate the same food, by the similar levels soot in thier lungs, showing an equivalent amount of time indoors around smoky fires, and similar levels of wear and tear on their bones, suggesting a lack of gender-division in much of the labor. This plus other evidence suggests a lack of patriarchal control.

However, there is no evidence of a matriarchy, either. And no evidence of a Mother Goddess worship. Indeed, the painted walls of Çatalhöyük have more males than females (lots of erect penises, showing that some things never change), and loads of non-human animals. Perhaps this statue was more reflective of one aspect of the religious lives of these peoples, showing a respect for females, but not a domination by them.