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©The Archaeological Settlements of Turkey - TAY Project
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Belen Tepe |
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For site maps and drawings please click on the picture...  |
For photographs please click on the photo...  |
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Type:
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Artifact Scatter |
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Altitude:
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m |
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Region:
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Marmara |
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Province:
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Bursa |
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District:
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Keles |
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Village:
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Kiranisiklar |
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Investigation Method:
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Survey |
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Period:
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| Location: It is situated on a hill at 1050 m altitude 1.5 km west of Kiranisiklar Village of Keles District in Bursa. |
| Geography and Environment: The hill it is located on is covered with pine trees. Belen Tepe is also a good flintstone resource. The area rich in flintstone is covered with red soil. |
| History: |
| Research and Excavation: It was visited and excavated within the scope of "Bursa and Environs Cultural Inventory" under the conduct of M Sahin in 2006. |
| Stratigraphy: |
| Small Finds: Small Findings: Bifacial tools are the most significant ones among the finds. One of them is a pro-form with a broken bottom. The other one is a bifacial tool part cracked on top and its one side is left untouched with cortex. Furthermore a large chopper made of flint has been found. Another remarkable find is a bifacial disc. There are marks on one side that shows its usage as anvil. It should be mentioned that the bifacial tools from Belen Tepe are so "typical" that they cannot be described as the similar of bifacial tools known from Thrace and Northwest Anatolia, which are known as "atypical". Yarimburgaz Magarasi is the only excavated Lower Palaeolithic findspot in Northwest Anatolia and finds do not show characteristics of Acheul and Levallois techniques. Bifacial tools of Belen Tepe rather more resemble the Middle and South Anatolian examples. There are also side scrapers with various sizes among the finds come out from Belen Tepe. More than half of the find are flakes and most of them have cortexes. It is possible to say that there is one center where the stone tools of Belen Tepe are produced when the flakes and cores considered together. Other important find group is Levallois cores [Dinçer 2010:3-5]. |
| Remains: |
| Interpretation and Dating: It is not yet possible to date the finds from Belen Tepe. And it is not going to be accurate before new finds are collected. Because the bifacial tools and Levallois cores suitable for dating can be seen in both Lower Palaeolithic and Middle Palaeolithic [Dinçer 2010:3-5]. The north section of Belen Tepe has not yet been investigated. However, it is possible to say that the area containing archaeological material covers an area of 150 m in diameter. Belen Tepe is a primary flint source. In the area, a great number of natural flint nodules were seen. More than half of these finds consist of cortex-bearing flakes. The ratio of the core is high. It is believed that Belen Tepe was used as workshop during Palaeolithic. The fact that the number of flake tools is few supports this idea [Dinçer 2014a]. |
