K. Aslihan Yener
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K. Aslihan Yener is an archaeologist of Turkish decent whose work on Bronze Age tin mines in Anatolia revealed a new possible source of the important metal.
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[edit] Education and early years
Aslıhan was born on July 21, 1946 in Istanbul to Turkish parents, but moved to the United States, in New Rochelle, New York at the age of six. In 1964, she entered Adelphi University in Garden City, New York planning to study chemistry. Soon she visited her native Turkey and subsequently transferred to Robert College in Istanbul in 1966, where she studied art history. While studying Roman ruins in Turkey, she noticed and became interested in evidence of prehistoric structures and then changed her major to archaeology, graduating in 1969. She received her PhD from Columbia University in New York in 1980, and was an associate professor of history at Bosphorus University from 1980 to 1988.
[edit] Early research
Her first project was using chemical techniques to trace the origins of prehistoric silver objects. She found that a lot of silver had come out of mines in the Taurus Mountains in Anatolia (Modern Turkey) in prehistoric times, and showed that mining in this region was more extensive than previously thought.
[edit] Bronze Age tin discoveries
Next, she turned to studying the origins of Bronze Age tin. Tin was as scarce and valuable as petroleum is today in the Bronze Age. It was a vital ingredient of bronze, used with copper to make the alloy. In 1982, she found traces of tin in the Taurus Mountains. This was somewhat surprising because early Assyrian records indicated that they imported tin into Anatolia, suggesting that the area did not have a supply of its own. In turn, the Assyrians imported large quantities of tin from Afghanistan.
She then spent the next five years searching for a Bronze Age tin mine with enough good quality ore to facilitate mining and smelting in Anatolia, working with the Turkish Geological Research and Survey Directorate (MTA), but found none. In 1987 another scientist who knew what Yener was looking for found cassiterite (tin ore) crystals in a stream in the Taurus foothills. This ore is purple; however previous searches had been looking for black ore because most tin ores are black. Near the site was a deserted valley with a hill called Kestel that proved to hold a tin mine. Additionally, fragments of Bronze Age pottery were found in and near the mine. Inside, there were veins of bright purple tin ore.
The Kestel mine has two miles of tunnels, many of what are only about two feet wide, just large enough to allow children to do the mining work. In one abandoned shaft, a burial of twelve to fifteen children was found, presumably killed while working in the mine.
In 1989, on a hill opposite the mine, associates found piles of Bronze age pottery, stone tools, some as old as 50,000 years, and evidence that this site had been continuously occupied from 3290 BC-1840 BC by up to one thousand people. A great deal of the city was built into the ground. The pottery at the site, named Göltepe, provided the final proof of the tin industry in the Bronze Age. Many thick crucibles, lined with slag were found at the site and tests revealed the slag to have very high concentrations of tin, 30% to almost 100%. It is likely that after the ore nuggets were washed, stone tools were used to grind them to a powder, and then the powder was heated to melt out the tin. All of this can be accomplished with Bronze Age tools and methods.
In 1993, Yener had found enough evidence to state that that tin mining in Anatolia was, "a fully developed industry with specialization of work" by 2870 BC, around the beginning of the Bronze Age. This meant that trade in the Bronze Age was probably more complicated than had been thought, as competition for tin existed.
[edit] Current position and research
In 1993, Yener joined the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago and remains there as the Associate Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology. Currently she is the director of the Amuq Valley Regional Projects in southern Turkey and is researching the site of Tell Atchana (ancient Alalakh), the capital city of the Kingdom of Mukish (the Amuq) during the Hittite period (Late Bronze Age c. 2000-1200 BC).
[edit] See also
[edit] Reference
Yount, Lisa (1996). Twentieth Century Women Scientists New York: Facts on File. ISBN 0-8160-3173-8.
