Stone ornaments found around the mouths and ears of skeletons at an 11,000-year-old burial site in southeast Turkey prove that humans have been piercing their bodies since prehistoric times and thinking about self-image, archaeologists said.Although small, thin and pointed stones have been found on several digs in the Fertile Crescent, which includes parts of modern-day Turkey and Iraq, and which is where ancient humans settled to farm, it was not known what they were used for \u2013 until now.\u201cNone of them have ever been found on the bodies in their original locations,\u201d said Emma Louise Baysal, a professor of archaeology at Ankara University, who co-authored an article on the ornaments.But at the Boncuklu Tarla site, \u201cwe have them all on the skeletons very close to the ear holes, to the lips,\u201d she said, allowing experts to conclude for the first time they would definitely be used as piercings.Some wear on the lower teeth of the skulls also showed that the individuals would have had lower lip piercings when alive.\u201cI think it shows we share similar concerns with the way that we look and that these people were also thinking hard about how they presented themselves to the world,\u201d she said.The site was established around 11,000 years ago by a group of hunter-gatherers, who gradually settled. Excavations are continuing at Boncuklu Tarla (Beaded Field), named after local farmers found thousands of beads, and where over 100,000 artefacts have been unearthed to date.The excavations not only show how early societies formed but also highlight striking similarities between modern humans and Neolithic people, highlighting lives we can empathise with, Baysal said.\u201cWhen you put on ornaments, particularly on your face, you can\u2019t see them, other people can see them. And you\u2019re projecting an image to other people.\u201d\u201cIt shows that we are, in many ways very similar.\u201d(Reuters)Pierced bodies. piercing, self-image, archaeology<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Stone ornaments found at an 11,000-year-old burial site in southeast Turkey indicate that humans have been piercing their bodies since prehistoric times. These ornaments were discovered around the mouths and ears of skeletons, suggesting their use as piercings. This finding at the Boncuklu Tarla site, which dates back to when ancient humans settled for farming in the Fertile Crescent, provides the first evidence of their original use due to their placement on the skeletons. Wear on the lower teeth of some skulls also indicated lower lip piercings. The site, established by hunter-gatherers who gradually settled, has yielded over 100,000 artifacts, showing early societal formation and similarities between Neolithic people and modern humans in terms of self-presentation and concerns about appearance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":4878,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"Default","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1521,2746,2577,1610,407,1831,148,2748,2747,885,2749,177,380,18],"class_list":["post-4877","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-other","tag-1521","tag-archaeology","tag-concerns","tag-evidence","tag-farmers","tag-farming","tag-local","tag-piercing","tag-piercings","tag-popular-on-web","tag-self-image","tag-turkey","tag-us","tag-world"],"acf":{"keyphrase":"","keywords":"","sourceimg":"","country-category":""},"yoast_head":"\n