FOR YEARS the intricate carvings at an ancient sanctuary in Turkey have baffled archaeologists but now some think they could actually be depicting a calendar.
Yazılıkaya is a 3,200 year old building that is thought to have played an important religious role in the capital city of the ancient Hittite Empire.
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This carving at Yazılıkaya is said to depict 12 gods of the underworldCredit: Wikipedia
Some of the relief carvings at the site in the old city of Hattusa show deities called Mesopotamian Anunnaki, which some conspiracy theorists think were aliens who came to Earth to mine gold but had to leave when the Antarctic glaciers melted.
However, a new theory suggests that the carvings may have functioned as a calendar that was way ahead of its time.
According to the New Scientist, researcher Juan Antonio Belmonte at the Institute of Astrophysics of the Canary Islands said: "It’s not only a striking idea, it’s reasonable and possible."
Yazılıkaya in Turkish simply means inscribed rock and the large Bronze Age limestone site is just as mysterious as its name.
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The site is a large limestone sanctuaryCredit: Wikipedia
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It has lots of carvings of godsCredit: Wikipedia
Although the carvings at the site have been studied for decades, now some experts are arguing that key aspects have been overlooked.
The researchers argue that some faded deity carvings would make one of the depictions add up to the number of days in a lunar month.
There are also marks underneath some of the depictions that look like an attempt to keep track of something.
Eberhard Zangger, president of Luwian Studies, an international non-profit foundation and his colleague Rita Gautschy from the University of Basel think that one carving containing 12 deities depicts the months in a year and another containing 30 depicts the days in a month.
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Some of the carvings are now quite faded leading some experts to believe that evidence of what the site was used for may have been missedCredit: Wikipedia
They think that the ancient people would have marked underneath the first of the 30 deities at the start of a month and then worked backwards to keep track of time.
The importance of the full moon is also depicted in some of the carvings.
The amount of deity carvings doesn't quite correspond with the amount of days in a year but Zangger and Gautschy think the Hittite people would have accounted for this by adding some additional months over a 19 year cycle.
Some Hittite buildings have also suggested the importance of astronomical events, like the Summer Solstice, in the society.
However, critics argue that the number of deities alone corresponding to a calendar is not enough conclusive evidence to confirm it was on.
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