The grave of a woman shamaness who lived 12,000 years ago has been found in Turkey: she was buried with animals. Photo

Archaeologists believe they have stumbled upon an ancient burial site of a female shaman in southeastern Turkey. According to scientists, the early Neolithic woman was "one" with animals, both in life and after death.

The woman's remains were unearthed at a settlement called Cemko Goyuk, which is approximately 12,000 years old. Her grave is a veritable menagerie of local fauna, Science Alert writes.

Buried beneath the limestone slab of what was once an ancient round house, the woman's bones were found carefully sealed together with those of a partridge, a weasel-like mammal, a sheep or goat, a meat-eating animal similar to a dog, and an extinct species of cattle. known as the auroch. All the animals in the grave are listed as wild.

The upturned skull of a auroch was found on the chest of a female skeleton.

"This discovery provokes the idea that the early sedentary people at Chemke Goyuk categorized the animals in their environment and gave them different meanings. Therefore, we can assume that the woman buried here had a special connection to this mythical world," explains the research team from Mardin Artukla University and Bitlis Eren University in Turkey.

No other grave like this one is known to exist in the same time or place, but similar discoveries in other parts of the Middle East have been interpreted as "traces of shamanic practices."

Scholars believe this woman was a special member of her semi-sedentary community of hunters, gatherers and fishermen. She passed away between the ages of 25 and 30.

Evidence suggests that the auroch bones found in the grave came from one individual who was about one and a half or two years old. Deep cuts on some of the bones indicate that the animal was butchered for meat before being buried. Even if the animal was killed during a memorial feast, it is surprising that there are no meat parts in the grave. It seems that the bones were deliberately chosen for spiritual purposes.

The team of scientists speculate that the skull of an auroch, for example, could represent the strength of a living animal, perhaps added to the grave to guard the body in the afterlife or to keep evil spirits from returning.

The partridge bone is where the wing and body join, and the weasel-like animal bone comes from the leg. Both may indicate "quick and sudden" movements, the researchers wrote.

Many different interpretations could explain the grave, the authors admit, and all of these hypotheses are extremely difficult, if not impossible, to test. But even if the grave does not represent the burial of a special person - a woman shaman, it indicates that those who buried him, adhered to beliefs in animism and shamanism.

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