BEYCESULTAN EARLY BRONZE AGE I POTTERY GROUP IN THE LIGHT OF NEW DATA

Abstract

The beginning of the Anatolian Early Bronze Age ( EB I- 3400-3000 BC), roughly contemporary with the Late
Uruk period in Mesopotamia, is marked by the rise of small kingodms whose exact character is not clearly
definable because of the absence of writing. In this period, the cultural settings of the Anatolian Peninsula
are rather varied and seem at least in part to reflect the large range of environmental diversity across the
region, and the numerous imposing mountain ranges that act as natural barriers to interaction.
Decades of research on pottery analysis have contributed to broadly define geo-cultural groups whose
boundaries often coincide with major natural borders. This paper aims at presenting new evidence on one of
these cultural groups, the “Pisidia/Lakes Region”, through the chrono-typological and spatial distribution
analysis of ceramic assemblages from ca 40 years of survey projects in the area. During Pisidia/Lake District
survey, red or black brilliantly burnished, thin walled and shallow fluted pottery and amphorae
characterizing the Beycesultan EBA culture was discovered for the first time in the region. Furthermore a
comparison is made to other better-known cultural groups, and with stratified contexts from excavated sites
in the western Anatolia including for instance Manisa-Gavurtepe, Beycesultan and Küllüoba. Brilliantly
black burnished shallow fluted pottery from Manisa-Gavurtepe‟s early phases sign to the western border of
Beycesultan EBA I culture. In addition to this, few examples of same type of pottery from Küllüoba
excavations shows that, Beycesultan EBA I culture has also relations with northern regions.