Message #78409

[Bianca]

So where did they grow food?

Tentative evidence has come from Arlene Rosen, a geoarchaeologist at the Institute of Archaeo-
logy in London and an expert in the analysis of phytoliths, tiny fossils formed when silica from
water in the the soil is deposited in plant cells. Researchers think phytoliths may help reveal some
of the conditions in which plants were grown. Rosen determined that the wheat and barley found
at marshy Catalhoyuk were likely grown on dry land. And yet, as other researchers had shown, the closest arable dry land was at least seven miles away.

Why would a farming community of 8,000 people establish a settlement so far from its fields? For Hodder, there is only one explanation.

The settlement site, once right in the middle of marshlands, is rich in the dense clays that villagers used to make plaster. They painted artworks on plaster, and they fashioned sculptures and figurines out of plaster.

“They were plaster freaks,” Hodder says.