An atlas of Earth’s mysterious places — megaliths, pyramids, lost and sunken cities — with the evidence shown plainly: what is verified, what is contested, and what is still unknown.

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Turkey

670 places in the atlas, 53 of them inscribed as UNESCO World Heritage.

Kinds found here

Tells269
Ancient villages207
Ancient cities205
Mounds198
Temple complexes169
Buried cities153
Archaeological wonders42
Submerged sites42
Sanctuaries39
Ancient ports37
Rock-cut sites24
Settlements24

How well established

Verified633
Accepted34
Contested3

Top regions

Central Anatolia24
Southeastern Anatolia, Sanliurfa15
Antalya Province13
Hattusa13
Central Anatolia, Konya10
Muğla Province9

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Verification

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Verified633 Widely accepted34 Contested3

Derinkuyu, Cappadocia

Adana Province6

Mersin Province6

Central Anatolia, Aksaray5

Gaziantep Province5

Southeastern Anatolia, Diyarbakir5

Hypothetical0

Unverified0

Pseudoarchaeology0

Heritage

UNESCO World Heritage only

Excavation

Partially excavated265 Excavation ongoing190 Excavated163 Buried27 Unexcavated14 Submerged10 Not applicable1

269 places · page 4 of 12

Tells

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Ancient city

Beycesultan Palace West Bastion

Bronze Age (3000–1200 BCE) · Bronze Age

Beycesultan Palace West Bastion in Denizli, Çivril, Turkey is a Bronze Age (3000–1200 BCE) ancient city attributed to Bronze Age.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Karkamış (Carchemish)

Early Bronze Age through Iron Age II (c.3000–717 BCE); Neolithic substratum · EBA–MBA Euphrates town → Hittite viceroyalty → Neo-Hittite Luwian-Aramaean

80 ha Euphrates tell — Hittite viceregal capital and Neo-Hittite sculpture city on Turkish-Syrian border (c.3000–717 BCE).

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Güvercinkayası

Middle Chalcolithic (Ubaid-related Late Chalcolithic 5500–4000 BCE window) · Central Anatolian Chalcolithic (Aksaray-Melendiz)

Middle Chalcolithic rocky citadel (5200–4800 BCE) — fortified island town on Melendiz obsidian route, Gülçur type-site.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Gusir Höyük West (Lake Gusir)

PPNA → early PPNB (9600–8700 cal BCE) · PPNA Tigris (Karul Upper Tigris Neolithic)

PPNA lakeside village (9600–9300 BCE) — rectangular pisè houses on Gusir sinkhole lake, progenitor cultivation bridge Göbekli→Çayönü.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Titriş Höyük

Early Bronze Age II–III through Middle Bronze (c.2600–2200 BCE peak; MBA sparse) · EBA Syro-Mesopotamian urban (Khabur-Euphrates city-state)

43 ha EBA orthogonal planned city (2600–2200 BCE) with 2.5 km wall and suburbs — largest Euphrates east-bank urban centre.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Korucutepe Keban East Mound

Late Chalcolithic to Mitanni (4000 BCE–1350 BCE) · Late Chalcolithic → EBA → MBA → Hittite → Mittani

Korucutepe Keban East Mound is the eastern salvage mound 300 m east of Korucutepe main on the Altınova plain (860 m) — twin mound testing the Keban Altınova Hittite–Mittani frontier.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Hallan Çemi Tepesi

Epipalaeolithic / PPNA transitional (Natufian-related → Pre-Pottery Neolithic) · Sason Epipaleolithic → PPNA Upper Tigris foragers

Epipalaeolithic-PPNA hamlet (c.11ky BP) with C-shaped communal auroch-bucrania building — earliest pig management and pre-Göbekli communal architecture, Sason Stream.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Tatarlı Höyük South Acropolis

Late Chalcolithic to Hellenistic (3500 BCE–100 BCE) · Chalcolithic Cilician → Hittite → Neo-Hittite → Hellenistic

Tatarlı Höyük South Acropolis is the southern citadel mound of Tatarlı Höyük on the Cilician plain west of the Ceyhan River — controlling the Kizzuwatna–Assyria (Qode) route.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Grike Havuz

PPNA–PPNB through Halaf (c.9500–7500 BCE; Halaf 6000–5500 BCE) · Taş Tepeler PPN (PPNA–PPNB forager-cultivators) and Halaf village

PPN hillside tell (c.9500–7500 BCE) with round houses and failed-precursor T-pillar — Taş Tepeler domestic village.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Ancient city

Tilmen Höyük

EB III to Byzantine · Yamhad/Amorite → Hittite → Neo-Assyrian → Byzantine

Old Babylonian Amanus-pass palace-fortress Tilmen with lion gate, archive and Yamhad vassal capital.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Boncuklu Tarla

PPNA through PPNB and early Pottery Neolithic · PPNA/PPNB Pre-Pottery Neolithic (Euphrates-Tigris transitional)

Ilısu north-bank mega hamlet (10300–7200 BCE) with 20 m pillared communal building — T-pillar stelae and largest PPNA stone assemblage in Upper Tigris, Mardin salvage.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Ancient village

Kenan Tepe

Pottery Neolithic to Early Bronze (6000–3000 BCE; peak LCh–Uruk 4500–3100 BCE) · Halaf-Ubaid → Late Chalcolithic north Mesopotamian → Uruk fringe

Upper Tigris concentric Chalcolithic complex with Uruk Bevelled Rim contact horizon.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Körtik Tepe

PPNA to early PPNB (Late Epipaleolithic → Neolithic) · Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPNA, Upper Tigris forager-cultivators)

PPNA buried village (11200–9500 cal BP) with 400 burials under round-house floors — Upper Tigris type-site for Neolithic mortuary behaviour, Ilısu salvage.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Tell Tayinat (Kunulua)

EBA through Iron III; Iron Age capital phase · Amuq EBA → Syro-Hittite Luwian-Aramaean Pattin → Assyrian Kinalua

Neo-Hittite capital of Pattin (20 ha double city) on Orontes — Bit-Hilani palaces, colossal Syro-Hittite sculpture and Luwian inscriptions, now cotton-buried lower town.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Ancient village

Girikihaciyan

Late Neolithic → Halaf → Ubaid (6000–4300 BCE) · Halaf (North Mesopotamian painted) → Northern Ubaid

Halaf hamlet (c.6000–4300 BCE, 175 m) — classic Halaf tholoi type-site on Diyarbakır piedmont (Watson/LeBlanc 1968).

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Mezraa-Teleilat

PPNA through Ubaid (c.9600–5500 BCE); PPNA, PPNB, Halaf, Ubaid · Upper Euphrates Neolithic (Mezraa phase) → Halaf → Ubaid

Neolithic–Halaf Euphrates tell (c.9600–5500 BCE) with PPNA round huts to Halaf painted pottery — Euphrates Neolithic type-site.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Yumuktepe (Yümüktepe)

Neolithic through Byzantine; Cilician corridor · Cilician Neolithic → Hittite Kizzuwatna → Neo-Hittite Que → Greco-Roman

Mersin coastal tell with 25 m deposit from Aceramic Neolithic (7000 BCE) to Roman — Garstang’s Cilician Neolithic–Hittite maritime gateway sequence.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Aşağı Pınar Kırklareli Thracian Tell

Early Neolithic to Chalcolithic (6200–3800 BCE) · Starčevo → Karanovo I → Karanovo–Gumelnița

Aşağı Pınar Kırklareli Thracian Tell is the flagship Turkish Thrace tell on the Ergene floodplain south of Kırklareli — an 8-m Early Neolithic to Chalcolithic tell (6200–3800 BCE) linking Karanovo I…

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Ancient city

Kayalıpınar (ancient Šamuḫa)

Middle Bronze to Iron Age (2000–700 BCE; peak Hittite 1500–1180 BCE) · Hattian → Old Assyrian karum → Hittite → Kaška/Phrygian

Confirmed Šamuḫa on upper Kızılırmak — palace archive and Storm-God cult city of Empire zenith.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Giricano Tepe (Gırcano)

Early Bronze Age through Iron Age II; MBA Khabur ware, Neo-Assyrian 11th–7th c. BCE · MBA Khabur ware → Middle Assyrian frontier → Neo-Assyrian provincial (Dunnu)

Upper Tigris Assyrian farmstead tell (c.1070–600 BCE) with Dunnu-ša-Uzibi archive — Ilısu salvage text site.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Ziyaret Tepe (Tušhan)

Bronze Age veneer → Neo-Assyrian provincial (Iron Age) · Mitanni → Middle/Neo-Assyrian (Ashurnasirpal II–Ashurbanipal)

Assyrian imperial capital Tušhan (883–611 BCE) — 32 ha citadel + lower town with palace, palace ware and Tigris quay, burned at Median fall, Upper Tigris frontier.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Hasankeyf Höyük

PPNA to Medieval; dominant Neolithic and Medieval citadel · PPNA/PPNB Neolithic → Assyrian → Artuqid Kurdish → Ottoman

Tigris gorge tell (PPNA Neolithic through Medieval) with cliff-edge Neolithic houses — gorge-side multi-period palimpsest partly encircled by Ilısu reservoir after 2020.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell

Norsun Tepe (Norsuntepe)

Late Chalcolithic to MBA (Uruk, EBA, MBA) · Late Uruk → Transcaucasian (Kura-Araxes) → MBA Hurrian

Keban salvage tell with Chalcolithic–MBA stratified sequence — Uruk enclave, Transcaucasian (Karaz) and early Mitanni levels before Euphrates dam flooding.

✓Verified

🇹🇷 Turkey · Ancient village

Köşk Höyük

Neolithic–Late Chalcolithic (6000–3200 BCE) · Central Anatolian (Cappadocian) Neolithic–Chalcolithic

Bor Plateau Neolithic village with painted floors, earliest copper and plastered skulls.

Turkey

Kinds found here

How well established

Top regions

Category

Heritage

Excavation

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269 places · page 4 of 12

Beycesultan Palace West Bastion

Güvercinkayası

Gusir Höyük West (Lake Gusir)

Titriş Höyük

Korucutepe Keban East Mound

Hallan Çemi Tepesi

Tatarlı Höyük South Acropolis

Grike Havuz

Tilmen Höyük

Boncuklu Tarla

Kenan Tepe

Körtik Tepe

Tell Tayinat (Kunulua)

Girikihaciyan

Mezraa-Teleilat

Yumuktepe (Yümüktepe)

Aşağı Pınar Kırklareli Thracian Tell

Kayalıpınar (ancient Šamuḫa)

Giricano Tepe (Gırcano)

Ziyaret Tepe (Tušhan)

Hasankeyf Höyük

Norsun Tepe (Norsuntepe)

Köşk Höyük