Kumtepe

Kumtepe (on German sand hill ) is a prehistoric settlement mounds in the Troad in northwest Anatolia, about five kilometers northwest of Troy on the west bank of the Karamenderes, the ancient Scamander. Kumtepe consists of four layers, Kumtepe IA, IB, IC and II The last two were badly damaged in the twentieth century. The hill is oval in shape, about 100 m long and 8 m high.

JW Sperling and Hamit Zübeyir Koşay conducted within the framework of Blegen's excavations at Troy in 1934 by the first investigations, whilst making it clear that the layers A and B ( about 3000 BC) were older than Troy I. 1993-1995 excavations were again made ​​to the Kumtepe under Manfred Korfmann. It turned out that there was a period of several hundred years between the first A and B layers. Recent 14C - studies date the layer A at the end of the sixth to the beginning of the fifth millennium BC The following period B could be dated to the last third of the fourth millennium BC. The layers C and II are about the same time to Troy I.

During excavation, stone foundations of buildings came to light as well as ceramics. Large amounts of mussel and oyster remains among the finds in layer A occupy a large proportion of marine animals in the diet, especially as was in the time of settlement of the hills overlooking the sea. Today it is located two kilometers away from the coast. But figs and legumes have significance for the eating habits of the residents after archaeobotanical investigations. In the following periods of grain cultivation gained in importance, initially barley, in period C emmer and einkorn, as well as in Troy I. In the commodities found still in layer A obsidian for tools and marble for containers in the foreground while increasing in Kumtepe B Copper and bronze were used. Also, spindle whorls were among the finds. Ceramic finds from the first excavations can be seen in the museums of Istanbul and Ankara, the findings of the new excavations in the Archaeological Museum of Çanakkale.

In 1995, six found chiselled into the rock pits with Hock burials per one adult. In the layers B and C were found burials of infants in vessels.