A microarchaeological approach to mud-brick architecture during the 9th - 8th millennium BC: Mud-brick and mortar recipes at Aşıklı Höyük

The transition to sedentism in Southwest Asia, and accompanying changes in the life-styles of the early Neolithic communities appeared in due to diverse and unique dynamics in different parts of this vast region. Aşıklı Höyük (8350-7300 BC), a Pre-Pottery Neolithic site in the Volcanic Cappadocia region of Central Anatolia, is one of the key sites where the region's unique Neolithisation process and the concomitant changes brought by this new way of life can be tracked continuously. The site, providing the earliest examples of mud-brick architecture in Volcanic Cappadocia, exhibits a particular case as the nature and transformation of mud-brick technologies can be followed continuously for centuries within the same settlement. In this thesis, with the core question of how the inhabitants of Aşıklı prepared mudbrick and mortar recipes and how and why their recipes changed over time, prehistoric building materials are studied with multiple complementary methods deriving from a microarchaeological approach. Aşıklı community strictly preferred mud-brick as the principal building material throughout their occupation at the site; however, this strict behavior was not true for their choices in raw material and sediment sources, preparation of tempers and binders, and the production technologies they preferred. This tendency is evidenced by the changes and standardization in recipes during the overall occupation sequence. The comprehensive analyses performed within the scope of this research suggest a mutual relationship between the rhythm of the diachronic changes in building material recipes and the social, technological, economic, and environmental changes occurred during the course of the transition to a fully established sedentary way of life. It could thus be suggested that the centuries of experience the Aşıklı community gained in mud-brick technologies played an active role in establishing and sustaining settled life at the site.