Last month, GHF Director of International Development and Partnerships Stefaan Poortman joined a group of donors to visit the GHF Project at Göbekli Tepe, Turkey. This is what he had to say about recent progress at the site:

In September 2013, I traveled to Urfa in Turkey, to visit the site of Göbekli Tepe with a number of GHF donors. With the end of the 2013 field season fast approaching on November 4th, Dr. Klaus Schmidt’s team was very busy with completing the season’s research and the construction of a temporary shelter over the southeastern excavation area to protect the site from the elements during the coming winter months. The shelter is being funded equally by GHF, The German Scientific Foundation and the German Archaeological Institute.

The Project recently received extremely good news that the European Union will provide almost 4M Euros through the Turkish Government for the construction of two permanent shelters over the southeastern and northwestern excavation areas, starting in late 2014. These state of the art shelters will not only protect the site but also facilitate responsible tourist access and viewing while allowing ongoing archaeological excavation and conservation work to proceed unimpeded.

I was additionally able to view and inspect the newly constructed 6km perimeter fence around the core archaeological site and buffer zone to provide increased security and preservation at Göbekli Tepe. The fence funding was secured by GHF from the J.M. Kaplan Fund in New York in late 2012, and construction was completed over the winter months using site laborers from the neighboring village. This work provided a group of 20 with employment during the otherwise quiet winter months.

Finally, while in Urfa, we were able to tour the construction site of the new Urfa Museum, which is being built by the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism. Scheduled to open in March 2014, this will be the biggest museum in Turkey and will be 70% dedicated to the rich Neolithic history of the region. Göbekli Tepe will be prominently featured, with one large room dedicated entirely to the site – complete with a model reconstruction of one of its enigmatic ceremonial rings.


Photos by Stefaan Poortman