64 i Flora Unveiled
All this suggests that there may have been two co- equal subcultures at Çatalhüyük, each
with its own mythology and practical concerns: a men’s subculture based in part on the
mythology of the hunting and domination of dangerous animals and a woman’s subcul-
ture based, among other things, on myths related to growing crops, giving birth and rear-
ing children, preparing food, and grooming cats to combat vermin. We propose that these
agricultural roles for the women of Çatalhüyük are variously encrypted in the “sacred tree”
paintings, female figurines (including the “Grain Bin Goddess”), the leopard reliefs, and the
clay balls with plant impressions used for cooking. If we are correct that the paintings of the
“animal- baiting scenes” are actually inspired by the collective need to protect crops from
large ruminants, crop protection would have been a common activity shared by both sexes,
just as the symbolism of the leopard is likely multilayered, encompassing women’s lives as
well as well as those of men.
Notes- Boyd, B. (1999), “Twisting the kaleidoscope”: Dorothy Garrod and the Natufian Culture, in
W. Davies and R. Charles, eds., Dorothy Garrod and the Progress of the Paleolithic. Oxbow Books;
Price, K. M. (2009), One vision, one faith, one woman: Dorothy Garrod and the crystallisation
of prehistory, in R. Hosfield, F. F. Wenban- Smith, and M. Pope, eds., Great Prehistorians: 150
Years of Palaeolithic Research, 1859– 2009 , Special Volume 30 of Lithics: 135– 155, Lithic Studies
Society, London. - Garrod, D. A. E. (1932), A New Mesolithic Industry: The Natufian of Palestine. Journal of
the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland 62: 257–269. - A former student of Abbe Breuil’s, Dorothy Garrod made a point of including women
on her excavation teams, against the prevailing attitudes of her male peers. In 1939, she was
elected Professor of Archaeology at Cambridge, becoming the first woman to hold a Chair
at either Cambridge or Oxford. Her election electrified the female students at Cambridge’s
women’s colleges. The newsletter of Newnham’s College declared, “Miss Garrod’s election to
the Disney Professor has been the outstanding event of the year and has filled us with joy.”
Nevertheless, Garrod faced discrimination from her male colleagues. For example, she was
barred from sitting at High Table in the men’s colleges, where academic policy decisions were
often discussed. See Smith, P. J. (2000), Dorothy Garrod, first woman professor at Cambridge.
Antiquity 74:131– 136. - Unger- Hamilton, R. (1989), The Epi- Palaeolithic of southern Levant and the origins of
cultivation. Current Anthropology 31:88– 103. - From the French word levant (rising), referring to the point where the sun rises.
- The Holocene epoch corresponds to the present warm period, which began at the end of
the Pleistocene about 11,700 years ago. It is part of the Quaternary period. The name is based on
the Greek words meaning “wholely new.” The recent phenomenon of accelerated global warm-
ing due to human industrial activity is sometimes referred to as the “Anthropocene.” - Bar- Yosef, O. (2014), The origins of sedentism and agriculture in Western Asia, in
C. Renfrew and P. Bahn, eds., The Cambridge World Prehistory. Cambridge University Press,
chapter 3.4: 408– 1438. - Management has been defined by Ofer Bar- Yosef as “manipulation and some degree of
control of wild species (plants or animals) without cultivation or morphological changes.”