11,000-year-old sculpture of a man riding a leopard unearthed in Turkey
11,000-year-old sculpture of man riding a leopard found in Turkey
Archaeologists in Turkey have discovered a unique 11,000-year-old statue at the Neolithic site of Karahan Tepe, depicting a human seated on a leopard. The 70-cm figure was found in its original position on a stone platform in a circular structure. This composition reverses the site's usual motif of humans carrying snarling leopards, offering new insights into the symbolic relationship between humans and wild animals in Pre-Pottery Neolithic culture.
The leopards in these sculptures are not slung on the man’s back as if he had killed them in the hunt or tamed them enough to carry them, but rather are depicted snarling, with teeth bared, very much alive and very much unfriendly.