Some time ago, I had collated a number of reports on Göbekli Tepe. I am not sure how much of this material I can post here without violating copyright laws, but I think I can safely post this under the fair use exemption. One thing that is clear is that while Göbekli Tepe is the most famous site from this time, it is only one of a number of settlements and religious sites that had been built at roughly the same time.
From: When Humanity Began to Settle Down (German Research -- Klaus Schmidt)
Amazingly, no residential buildings have been discovered up to now. However, at least two phases of monumental religious architecture have been uncovered. Of these, the oldest layer, with its richly adorned monolithic pillars, is the most impressive. The buildings on this layer are circular, with a diameter of over 20 metres, and constructed from quarry stone.Their age is impressive, having been dated to the 10th millennium BC, a time when men still lived as hunter-gatherers. This opened up a layer of the Stone Age, in which the so-called Neolithic Revolution took place. The next oldest layer has been dated to the 9th millennium. It has been demonstrated that some plants and animals were already used during this millennium, and that elaborate settlements had been built, such as Nevalı Çori, which lies 50 kilometres further north. The excavation there, which caused a sensation in the 1980s, opened a new window on a previously unsuspected world of Stone Age culture. The type of dwelling which was excavated in Nevalı Çori, with a living space in front and a rectangular area behind for storing provisions, may be considered the prototype of the Anatolian farm house that can still be found today. Even then, the houses were up to 6 meters wide and 18 metres long.
Nevalı Çori was submerged by floods from the Atatürk Dam Lake in 1992. Well preserved, although not yet completely researched, is the Karahan Tepe, which features hundreds of T-shaped pillars and is situated about 50 kilometres southeast of the Göbekli Tepe. Residential buildings like those in Nevalı Çori appear to be completely absent from Karahan. The same applies to the Sefer Tepe, located about 80 kilometres east of Göbekli Tepe. At this small, likewise unexplored site there are numerous T-pillars, but probably no residential buildings. The pattern is repeated at Göbekli Tepe: the settlement traces, including caverns, fire places and residential buildings, which are normally characteristic of Stone Age sites, are so far missing. Though the research results are still pending, it appears that there were different types of location: genuine settlements like Nevalı Çori and purely religious places such as Göbekli Tepe, Sefer Tepe or Karahan Tepe.
The stone pillars are the most characteristic feature of these archaeological sites. They only occur in monumental form at Göbekli Tepe. The pillars are without doubt abstract representations of people; they are, in other words, stone statues of anthropomorphic beings. Representations of arms and hands were discovered on the sides of several pillars in both Nevalı Çori and in Göbekli Tepe. The head is represented by the cross of the T-shaped pillars, with a longer face section facing the centre of the circular structure and a shorter back of the head, corresponding to the natural proportions of the human head. Differentiation of sex was evidently not intended. It is also clear that the minimalist form of representation was intentional, because the other statues and reliefs found at the site offer sufficient proof of the artist’s ability to produce naturalist works. If anything, the stone pillars represent ancestors, ghosts of the dead or daemons, and have therefore been given an ambiguous form.
From: Settlement Pattern in Southeast Anatolia: An analysis of the structures at the site of Nevalı Çori.
Hallan Çemi 10700 – 9210 BC
Çayönü (Round Buildings) 10150 – 9400 BC
Çayönü (Grill Buildings) 9400 – 9100 BC
Çayönü (Channeled Buildings) 9100 – 9000 BC
Çayönü (Cobble-Paved Buildings) 9000 – 8600 BC
Çayönü (Cell Buildings) 8600 – 8300 BC
Jerf el-Ahmar 9200 – 8700 BC
Göbekli Tepe 9100 – 8750 BC
Nevalı Çori 8540 – 8300 BC
The greatest similarity between Göbekli Tepe and Nevalı Çori concerns the ‘T’-shaped pillars. The T-pillars with miniature reliefs indicate according to the excavators a different building perception of the inhabitants. Two buildings in Göbekli Tepe, the Lion Pillar Building and the Schlangenpfeilergebäude show remarkable similarities with findings in Nevalı Çori concerning the architecture, relief and sculpture.
To the southeast of the settlement, the Lion Pillar Building is the only structure of Level II that has decorated pillars. The ‘Löwenpfeilergebäude’ is a semi-subterranean, single-roomed, rectangular structure, which measures 6.5 x 4.4 m and is located in the southeast of the mound. It has four T-shaped pillars standing and two more built into the side walls facing each other. Two of the freestanding pillars (1.60 and 1.45 in height) have lions depicted in low relief on their upper parts. The lions have open mouths as they were growling and clearly shown male organs as it is the case in almost all the animal figures at Göbekli Tepe. The southern pillar (1m high) built into the wall is decorated as well and thought to be in secondary context. Reminding very much of Nevalı Çori pillars, it has parallel lines (hands) and a deep vertical line (tie or krawatten) above them, incised on it. Between the northeastern pillar and the northeast corner of the structure, a stone bench was placed. The floor of the ‘Löwenpfeilergebäude’ is terrazzo.
The Schlangenpfeilergebäude of the earliest level of the settlement is represented by four round or oval structures, with benches and decorated T-shaped pillars that are more than 3 m in height. In this layer several monolithic architectural features appeared. One room is accentuated by two central pillars, 3.1 m high, with T-capitals. In a later phase these were incorporated into a curving wall, diminishing the size of the room. Both pillars were framed by a bench of stone slabs. The pillars are set as they were delineating the structures and there are two of them in each structure, standing in the center. In some cases, pillars look as if they were set before the walls. This type of arrangement resembles the Nevalı Çori Cult Building very much, both concerning the monumentality and the placement of pillars, however the motifs on the pillars demonstrate a different world.
Reliefs of Göbekli Tepe show very often common motifs as in Nevalı Çori. Three of the total of five pillars boasted relief decoration. Pillar 1 is decorated with a "tapestry" of interwoven snakes and scattered individual snakes in low relief, depicted below is a ram. Snakes seem to be quite commonly chosen to decorate pillars. There are single snakes, groups of them, even a ‘net’ of them. They are depicted as wavy lines that form the body and slightly pointed heads.
