A Dr Kate Turner short story in Catalhöyük
The archaeologist sat back on her butt. The sweat was running into her eyes and dripping off her chin. Her hands were dry, her fingernails were broken and caked in dirt. She smelled like dirt. She tasted dirt. She had become dirt. She was in heaven! Years of study and publishing had brought Dr Kate Turner to Turkey to take charge of her first archaeological dig at the famed Catalhöyük site. This was her third day on site and her third day getting her hands dirty. There was no way Kate was going to be desk bound while the mysteries of the Neolithic called to her like sirens called to sailors lost at sea. She was not going to become a slave to the pen, paper and keyboard when she would wield her trowel, paintbrush and bucket like the archaeological warrior she was born to be.
Kate wiped away the sweat and crossed her legs. She looked around at all the other experts on site: bio archaeologists who took samples of human bone to find out what they ate and what diseases they might have had; zoo archaeologists who did the same to animal bones but also determined what animals human beings ate by looking at the bones thrown in to the rubbish middens; ceramicists and archaeologists like herself. Kate knew that the experts came from all over the world. But she was excited to see the presence of local experts, mostly women who dedicated their lives to the scholarly pursuit of their own history. Women of her own heart.
Kate took a long and deep swig from her water bottle. The days could get incinerator hot on site and even with the spectacular roof that covered the site, the cool air of the early morning was giving way to the dry and determined heat of the Anatolian Plateau where Catalhöyük was located. But not even the heat could put a dent in Kate’s excitement. She was finally where she dreamed she could be. There was something magical about Catalhöyük. A 9000 year old human settlement that was inhabited by people who lived lives remarkably similar to our own. Family groups gathered in two storey houses. Open fires provided a central – albeit smoky – gathering place for the elderly and the young. There were familiar foods too – meat, berries, nuts and grains. Kate smiled as she realised that the inhabitants of Catalhöyük were eating paleo diets but had no way of bragging about it on their Insta stories. Despite coming so far with technology, the correct human diet had not really changed.
In the houses, people would use ladders to climb to the top storey. Much like her nieces climbed to the top bunk to survey the world of their bedroom. But what drew Kate to Catalhöyük were the macabre burial practices. The people of Catalhöyük buried the remains of their loved ones under the kitchen floor. Sometimes they removed the bones and reburied them when they remodelled the house. Many times, they pushed the bones of the dead aside when they buried a new body. When Kate told her nieces that she was taking a job in a place they could not pronounce, they were sad. When she told them why, they were morbidly fascinated and begged to be able to come and visit in the school holidays. More young women of my own heart. There is a comfort in the sisterhood of women who seek to understand prehistoric and ancient societies and Kate constantly gravitates to them.
Breakfast! The voice in her head cut through her ruminations and announced in an authoritative voice: Feed me. Now! Thoughts of freshly baked bread smothered in butter and vegemite propelled her to the camp kitchen. You can take the girl out of Australia and drop her in a Neolithic archaeological site, but you can never take Australia out of the girl. Dr Kate Turner’s vegemite supply was as well travelled as she was. Certainly not a paleo breakfast, but the prefect breakfast for an archaeologist on a Neolithic dig!
