Sayı 07- Ocak / Mart 2012 - Antalya Rehberler Odası

The eastern side of the cave
have a total of 52 petroglyphs
in different places with 1 sun
motif, 1 wild ass, 2 deer and 48
mountain goats. More than 90%
of the 123 petroglyphs around
the Kurbanağa Mağarası depict
mountain goats. In contrast to
this, more than 85% of the motifs
on Yazılıkaya’s large and
small panels represent deer.
The majority of the images around
the Kurbanağa Cave were
carved in the Bronze Age. This
indicates that deer species in
the vicinity declined sharply during
the Bronze Age.
THE YAZILIKAYA PICTURES
Most numerous are the rock pictures
in Yazılıkaya near the village
of Çamuşlu, 25 km northwest
of Kağızman. The depictions in
Yazılıkaya on the southern foot
of the Aladağ Mountain (3134
m.) were presented to the world
of science by Prof. Dr. Kılıç Kökten
in 1968-69.
The andesite rock known as the
Large Panel is 3.5 – 4 m wide
and 14 m long and is smooth
as glass. It features 77 deer,
including 54 stags, 11 does and
12 fawns, 13 mountain goats,
many human figures, bulls and
wild cattle.
Here it is the hunters that attract
the most attention. They do not
carry any kinds of weapon in
their hands but one man seen
from the front has a very long
club under his left arm. The hunters
are very small compared
with the deer; some are shown
from the front and some from
the side.
Even though the human figures
are depicted very small,
the execution of them is quite
beautiful and they look very lively.
These interesting figures,
which are the oldest hunters
from prehistory, display in all
their vivacity a very mystical
hunting scene not understood
by us at present.
The pictures in Anatolia that
comes closest to this animated
hunting scene set by the
hunters are the pictures in Sinek
Çayı rock shelter in the
Diyarbakır Çayönü settlement.
The human and animal figures
made with incision and
percussion techniques have
been produced for ceremonial
or magic reasons rather than
for decorative purposes; some
of the figures are shown walking
towards the right, and some
to the left, and some, because
of lack of space are depicted
on top of one another.
Some of the deer are shown full
bodied, while some of them appear
stylised with a thick line. A
common link between the deer
that have been made by different
artists at different periods,
are the crescent shaped forked
antlers opening out to the sides.
Particularly striking are the full
bodied deer shown with crescent
shaped antlers.
The deer, bulls, wild cattle, mountain
sheep and mountain goats
drawn with meticulous care
by the hunter artists were game
animals in the prehistoric era
that had great nutritive value.
Using obsidian pens, the hunters
drew pictures of the animals
on the rocks due to their belief
in magic, to invoke a successful
hunt.
On a rock surface of 52 m² at
about four metres height from
the ground there are more than
90 pictures of humans and animals,
representing the largest
prehistoric artistic painting. This
extraordinary picture, the like of
which is found nowhere else in
Anatolia or the rest of the world
is even today contemplated in
awe.
Because there is no more empty
space on the rock face called
the Large Panel, pictures have
been made on a rock 16 metres
to the east of it. The western
face of this rock, which is called
the Little Panel, is smooth as
glass, and here are pictures of
10 deer, including seven stags
and three does, three human
figures and one wild donkey.
The technique by which the
animals have beenmade and
also their species correspond
to those on the Large Panel.
The human figure with a bow
that with bent knees shoots an
arrow towards the donkey is
beautifully drawn from the side.
More than two thirds of the
pictures on the Large and the
Small Panel are deer. The sizes
of the deer that have been executed
quite realistically using
the percussion technique measure
on average 8 x 13 cm. The
deer depicted on the rock face
in the Kağızman region exceed
92 animals and they look rather
different from those in the Kars
- Borluk Valley.
The more than 105 human and
animal figures on Yazılıkaya
are thought to have been made
over a long period of time. The
animals, whose bodies and antlers
are quite realistically made,
appear to have been made at
an earlier period while the stylised
figures belong to a later
date.
Some of the hunters are seen
from the side, and some from
the front, the aim seems to have
been to depict a hunting scene.
Although it cannot be determined
unequivocally, the pictures
on the Yazılıkaya are believed
to have been made 15.000 -
7.000 B.C.