Göbekli Tepe turned the story of civilisation upside down. On a limestone ridge above the plain north-east of Şanlıurfa, about thirteen kilometres from the city, hunter-gatherers raised rings of enormous T-shaped stone pillars more than eleven thousand years ago, some of them taller than a bus and carved with foxes, snakes, boars, vultures and scorpions. That is some six thousand years before Stonehenge, and before pottery, metal tools or farming had been invented. The assumption had been that people built monuments after they settled and farmed. Göbekli Tepe suggests that the urge to gather and build may have come first.
The German archaeologist Klaus Schmidt began to dig the site in the mid-1990s, after surveying a hill that others had written off as a medieval cemetery, and work has gone on ever since. Only a fraction of the mound has been excavated, and geophysical surveys show many more enclosures beneath the soil. Nobody knows for certain what the circles were for, whether temples, meeting places or something else, and that uncertainty is part of the fascination. A walkway and a modern canopy now protect the main enclosures, and the visitor centre explains the finds. The site was listed by UNESCO in 2018.
Şanlıurfa itself deserves time. Known locally as Urfa, and in antiquity as Edessa, it is a city of golden stone, with a pool of sacred carp beside the mosques at Balıklıgöl where tradition places the birthplace of Abraham, and a bazaar of copper workers and spice sellers. Its cooking is among the best in Turkey: Urfa kebab, mildly spiced and served with onion and sumac, lahmacun, and the dark flaked pepper called isot, which tastes of smoke and raisins.
The ride from the city is short, across a dry plain of wheat, cotton and pistachio. Roads are good, traffic is moderate and the summer heat is formidable, often over forty degrees, which makes midday on the exposed hilltop a trial. The cooler months of spring and autumn are better, though winters can be wet and cold. Fuel is easy in Şanlıurfa, a city of nearly half a million, and the site has a café and parking.
Go early, carry water and wear a hat, because the ridge offers almost no shade.