Ancient baby burial draws interest at museum

AMASYA

The 5,000-year-old jar burials of four people, including a baby, that were found 15 years ago in the northern province of Amasya are kept in a special showcase at the Amasya Museum.

The significant findings that have been unearthed during the archaeological excavations in the city and shed light on the history of the Young Neolithic, Ottoman and Chalcolithic periods, are exhibited in the Amasya Museum, which is home to 23,000 artifacts. Visitors show more interest in the special section where the jar burials are shown.

The museum director, Celal Özdemir, said that during excavations in 2007, they also found a gift to the dead, which the baby used to drink milk or water, in the baby burial.

“During the excavations in 2007, we saw that 12 civilizations lived in this region without interruption. At the end of the work, we unearthed the jar burials, which we call Pitos, at a depth of about 1.5 meters on the floor of the house, where the people of the Chalcolithic Age lived. The most interesting thing there is the baby tomb, which we exhibit in the museum.

The baby was buried in the fetal position like in the mother’s womb. When we cleaned the burials, we found that they were a family; mother, father, relatives and a baby girl aged 2.5 to 3 years old, and was buried with the gifts she used in her daily life. The baby tomb is 5,000 years old. We also discovered a hole in the parents’ burial, indicating that it was believed that there was a spirit emanating from humans. These family burials, especially the baby burial, are of great interest to visitors,” Özdemir said.