{"id":994324,"date":"2026-07-29T16:05:34","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T13:05:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wayanatapas.com\/?p=994324"},"modified":"2026-10-16T18:15:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T15:15:12","slug":"tarih-diyarbakiri-isaret-ederken-kortik-tepe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wayanatapas.com\/en\/tarih-diyarbakiri-isaret-ederken-kortik-tepe\/","title":{"rendered":"When History Points to Diyarbak\u0131r, What Are We Waiting For?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Georgia became the \u201cCradle of Wine\u201d with 6000 BC. K\u00f6rtik Tepe in Diyarbak\u0131r fell silent in 9300 BC.<\/h2>\n

To be frank, I am not one of those who believe that international competitions over who has the \u201coldest\u201d of something are particularly meaningful. Finding the world\u2019s oldest bread or oldest wheel in a country is exciting, of course. After all, such a discovery is less an achievement than a gift that the past has bestowed upon that country. But the oldest of anything can never become a shining treasure if its significance has not been understood, embraced and given the value it deserves.<\/p>\n

K\u00f6rtik Tepe, the subject of today\u2019s article, is a very good example. According to laboratory analyses, chlorite vessels excavated at K\u00f6rtik Tepe, made from what is also known as \u201cgreen stone\u201d, contain tartaric acid residues associated with grape juice or wine. Settlement at K\u00f6rtik Tepe stretches back some 11,300 years.<\/p>\n

Tartaric acid has also been identified in pottery excavated at the archaeological site of Gadachrili Gora in neighbouring Georgia. Settlement there dates back approximately 8,000 years.<\/p>\n

Our neighbour embraced its 8,000-year-old evidence of wine wholeheartedly. It placed wine tourism at the heart of its tourism policy. And it gave itself a title: the Cradle of Wine.<\/p>\n

When the people of K\u00f6rtik Tepe, near Bismil in Diyarbak\u0131r, were alive, even the shaping and firing of clay vessels had yet to be discovered. Their vessels therefore had to be carved from stone.<\/p>\n

Unless we are making a mistake in basic arithmetic, the evidence associated with wine at K\u00f6rtik Tepe predates Georgia\u2019s by 3,300 years. So where should we look for the reason why today\u2019s reality has made Georgia the \u201cCradle of Wine\u201d while T\u00fcrkiye remains largely absent from the story?<\/p>\n

Probably in our cultural and tourism policies.<\/p>\n

\"K\u00f6rtik<\/h2>\n

First, Let Us Take a Closer Look at K\u00f6rtik Tepe<\/h2>\n

K\u00f6rtik Tepe is located at P\u0131narba\u015f\u0131, near the village of A\u011f\u0131l in the Bismil district of Diyarbak\u0131r, west of the confluence of the Tigris River and Batman Creek. It was first documented in 1989 during the \u201cTigris-Euphrates Archaeological Survey Project\u201d. In the following years, as plans for the Il\u0131su Dam took shape, it became clear that the site would be submerged, and rescue excavations began in 2000.<\/p>\n

The main settlement phase at K\u00f6rtik Tepe belongs to what archaeologists call the Pre-Pottery Neolithic, a period before ceramic vessels had come into use. Radiocarbon (C14) analyses of the finds have shown that life at the settlement stretches back some 11,300 years. Among the most important finds to have survived from K\u00f6rtik Tepe are vessels carved from green stone known as chlorite and from marble-like stone.<\/p>\n

And it is precisely the discovery of tartaric acid during laboratory analyses of these vessels that makes K\u00f6rtik Tepe the subject of this article.<\/p>\n

What Does the Presence of Tartaric Acid Mean?<\/h2>\n

Tartaric acid occurs naturally in particularly high concentrations in grapes, the fruit of Vitis vinifera.<\/em> As archaeology has increasingly incorporated laboratory methods, residue analysis has allowed us to understand what substances ancient vessels once contained. The presence of tartaric acid indicates that products derived from grapes were stored in these vessels. Leave grape juice on its own for a few days and natural fermentation can begin. In archaeological research, tartaric acid is widely used as an important biomarker when investigating the history of wine.<\/p>\n

\"K\u00f6rtik<\/h2>\n

What Was Happening 11,300 Years Ago?<\/h2>\n

The beginning of the 10th millennium BC was a major turning point in human history. As the Ice Age came to an end, the arc-shaped fertile zone between the Taurus and Zagros Mountains, the region we know as the Fertile Crescent, became the setting for some of humanity\u2019s earliest great experiments.<\/p>\n

Agriculture as we know it had not yet begun. But human communities had begun to identify, gather and process wild cereals and the wild grapevines that grew abundantly around them. The domestication of the grapevine and humanity\u2019s early strategic engagement with grapes form one of the most fascinating chapters of the Neolithic Revolution.<\/p>\n

(For our detailed examination of the domestication of the grapevine and the unique role of the Fertile Crescent in this process, see<\/em> The Birthplace of Wine: The Fertile Crescent and the History of Wine<\/a><\/strong><\/span> .<\/em>)<\/p>\n

What Did Georgia Do?<\/h2>\n

What our neighbour Georgia did was not really a marketing miracle. It was the strategic result of recognising, embracing and correctly interpreting its cultural heritage.<\/p>\n

Excavations at Gadachrili Gora and Shulaveris Gora, approximately 50 kilometres south of Tbilisi, uncovered fragments of clay pottery dating to around 6000 BC, roughly 8,000 years ago. Prof. Patrick McGovern, one of the leading figures in biomolecular archaeology, and his team chemically analysed residues preserved in the pores of these fired clay vessels and identified tartaric acid.<\/p>\n

Georgia did not allow this scientific finding to remain buried in academic papers and eventually be forgotten. Through a carefully constructed communication and tourism strategy, it took several steps:<\/p>\n