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Bitumen "ingot" with reed impressions, HN6106 Op. 11 locus 40 (Schwartz and Hollander 2000:fig. 5).	Bitumen with basketry impression. HN3516 Op. 7 locus 39 (Schwartz and Hollander 2000: fig. 3).
Uruk bevel rim bowl with bitumen-coated interior, possibly used for processing melted bitumen.. HN6212 Op. 10 locus 65 (Schwartz and Hollander 2000:fig.4).	Juglet with bitumen waterproofing. HN201 Op. 1 locus 12 (Stein and Misir 1994b:fig. 7).
Chipperd stone sickle blade with bitumen hafting. HN12057 Op. 12 locus 145.	Bitumen hafting from tool handle showing string impressions. HN2259 Op. 7 locus 25.

Northwestern News   Last updated 11/20/2002     MEDIA CONTACT: Pat Vaughan Tremmel at (847) 491-4892 or at p-tremmel@northwestern.edu November 18, 2002 Earliest River Boats May Have Carried Petroleum EVANSTON, Ill. --- Recently discovered boat fragments found at the site of Hacinebi in southeast Turkey offer evidence of the world’s earliest riverboats and the earliest transport of trade goods -- including petroleum products -- by river, according to Mark Schwartz, a graduate student in anthropology at Northwestern University, whose findings were published in the fall edition of the British archaeological journal, Antiquity. The only direct evidence linked to the world’s first boats to travel by river, rather than by sea, Schwartz’s finds bolster scholars’ understanding of the early development of maritime technology and its tie to transportation and trade during the very early stages of the development of civilization. While finds in the Persian Gulf demonstrate early transport on oceans, it was river trade that played a greater part in the development of the earliest civilizations both in terms of the sheer volume of goods moved and the strength of the trade routes. Dating to 3800 B.C., the fragments are remnants of the bitumen (natural petroleum tar) coating placed on early reed boats to waterproof them. Evidence suggests that the bitumen-coated boats also were likely to have carried petroleum products as cargo. Coupled with chemical sourcing data from Hacinebi, Schwartz’s discovery points to the earliest form of the petroleum trade in the Near East. "With all the current, heated discussions about the petroleum industry in the Near East, it is ironic that the world’s earliest river boats in this area -- and indeed the world -- were also transporting petroleum," said Schwartz. The presence of the waterproofed boats provides a more complete picture of the ancient exchange economy of southeast Anatolia. The fragments directly document the boat’s connection to a trading center and the first time boats were used to transport trade goods on a river system." Much of the research on trade and transport in the Near East has focused on Mesopotamia, where the world’s first cities appeared during the fourth millennium. But this boat find and the site of Hacinebi lie outside of the "heartland of cities." While evidence does point to trade with southern Mesopotamia (present day Iraq) during the later phases of Hacinebi’s history, excavations, led by Gil Stein, the director of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, suggest that the site played an important role in local Anatolian trade even before the arrival of merchants from Mesopotamia. "The presence of local trade goods such as copper, shell and chlorite at the site along with our recent discovery of the early reed boat fragments demonstrate that the people of Hacinebi were developing impressive long-distance exchange relationships on their own before the arrival of Mesopotamians," said Schwartz. The people of Hacinebi were involved in early metallurgy and likely were using bitumen-covered boats to transport copper ore, among other items, down the Euphrates from the Ergani source 200km north in the river. The Hacinebi area was historically an important place for trade and transport. Stable carbon and hydrogen isotope analyses performed by Schwartz, with David Hollander of the University of South Florida, suggest that bitumen was transported to the site from at least three different Anatolian sources and document a non-Mesopotamian, Anatolian source of bitumen for the reed boat coating. The fragments show distinct impressions of reed bundles and rope and clearly document ancient boat building and the widespread use of this ancient technology. Modern reconstruction of ancient reed boats try to depict these types of vessels, but bitumen is rarely used on them, making them prone to water logging and/or rotting. "The fact that the ancient people of Hacinebi took the time to waterproof their reed boats demonstrates a high degree of investment," said Schwartz. "These boats were meant to last, and the very thick coating signifies a boat that was much larger than a simple canoe." These findings relate directly to recent discoveries from Kuwait which point to even older (5000 B.C.) ocean-going reed boats in the Persian Gulf. "Taken together, these finds point to interesting parallels between different regions and cultures and reinforce each other’s validity," said Schwartz. "You may be able to refute that one find of reed-impressed bitumen is not part of a reed boat, but it is much more difficult to argue against many finds from different areas and time-periods of the Near East." Ethnographic records point to the existence of reed boats in many cultures throughout the world including the Sudan, coastal Peru, lake Titicaca, New Zealand and the marshes of southern Iraq. The boats in the Near East were constructed in similar ways -- reed bundles waterproofed with bitumen --illustrating ingenuity in the construction of impressive watercraft with simple materials that ancient people found nearby. The discoveries were all found at sites where trade is believed to have played an important role in ancient economies. Many ancient societies such as Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Harrappa used riverine trade routes extensively in the formative stages of their development. It was only after they had been states for a few hundred years that they relied on long-distance trade on the world’s oceans. Shipping timber, stone, copper and bitumen down the Euphrates River would have been relatively cheap, quick and efficient means of supplying a developing society with materials it needed to grow and flourish. While many ancient civilizations were started on rivers for agricultural reasons, trade on these rivers was an important outgrowth and a key ingredient for their development. "With all of the recent advances in technology, water transport is still the most efficient way to move cargo and goods long distances," said Schwartz. "Even though the Euphrates has always been a dangerous river to navigate, these ancient merchants had a lot of incentive to engage in this early version of the petroleum industry."

All people are related, but "In the article in the November 2001 issue of The American Journal of Human Genetics, Ariella Oppenheim of the Hebrew University of Israel wrote that this new study revealed that Jews have a closer genetic relationship to populations in the northern Mediterranean (Kurds, Anatolian Turks, and Armenians) than to populations in the southern Mediterranean (Arabs and Bedouins)." (from http://www.barzan.com/ kevin_brook.htm)

Also:

"A family tree of Indo-European languages suggests they began to spread and split about 9,000 years ago. The finding hints that farmers in what is now Turkey drove the language boom - and not later Siberian horsemen, as some linguists reckon. ... Around this time, farming techniques began to spread out of Anatolia - now Turkey - across Europe and Asia, archaeological evidence shows." (From "Language tree rooted in Turkey" by John Whitfield, http://www.nature.com/ nsu/nsu_pf/ 031124/ 031124-6.html)

Both of these studies would place the location in the Ararat area since we have recorded (Genesis 11:2-9) that soon after the flood they migrated out of the mountainous regions from the east. Then soon after that the multiple languages were developed as their speech was confused and then from there they were scattered. Also the linguistic study places the scattering to about 9,000 years ago for those of the Indo-European languages, therefore, the flood would be sometime prior to 9,000 years ago.