Skeletons of massacred found in Turkey

[samarkeolog]

Prof Gaunt opened his mouth without having any evidence to back up his claims. He gave his opinions without having visited the site, and without having seen any proper photographs of the site. All he saw were some low-resolution newspaper photos. Nor did he use words like "maybe" or "possibly" to characterise his theory. No, he was so certain that only the word "likely" would do! Such clearly unprofessional behaviour questions his academic credability. More so, when one considers he made those comments in the run-up to the publication of his book dealing with the events which he claimed the cave contained relics of.

No-one is expecting you to name the names of those who took you there. But some explanation of how you found your way to the right cave is required, otherwise how do we know you even were there. And you didn't even bring a torch?

What evidence do you have to back up your claim to have "visited my first mass grave today, my first nationalist-archaeologist-allied-with-the-military-destroyed mass grave"? Didn't even occur to you to use the word word alleged! All you have is hot air. You are a typical self-obsessed blogger. Stop posturing.

As for the rest of you, the reality is that any value in samarkeolog's activity relating to this news report is illusionary. As illusionary as the value of the initial reports, Gaunt's opinions, and the Turkish "excavation". The only value here is the proof that amongst younger archaeologists, Armenian stuff is now seen as "cool". Which is something positive, I suppose, since earlier generations would tremble and go pale at the mere mention of the word.

In the Turkish Daily News article, they noted that, 'On examining the grave, Gaunt refused to collaborate with the Turkish historians. It had been tampered with since it was first uncovered, making it impossible to conclusively establish its origins or the circumstances of the human remains.'

They relayed that: 'It could well be a Roman grave, he [David Gaunt] said, but the point was to examine the remains of 38 bodies there and that is now difficult if not impossible.'

Why do you refuse to read what has been written or to recognise and address it in your comments?

I can't say much or any more about how I found the site without implicating people, but you have seen the photographs I took from the site that match up with those in the media; so, I did go to the site.

There was a torchlight shining on the material in the photographs, but the material didn't show up well, so I used my camera flash, which was more powerful (which is why you can't see the torchlight).

I gave lots of evidence, from the photographic documentation to the scientific examination of the natural and cultural formation processes that could have caused the site to be in the state it was; that is why I concluded that it was 'the allegedly - to me, fairly definitely - Armenian (or other Other) mass grave'.

As for the horse-xxxx about 'Armenian stuff' now being 'seen as "cool"', archaeologists have been doing forensic archaeology for many years now, but they have been digging at sites of recent conflicts, from Argentina (http://www.eaaf.org/) to Guatemala (http://www.fafg.org/) to Bosnia-Hercegovina (http://www.ic-mp.org/) to Iraq (http://eaaf.typepad.com/cr_iraqi_kurdistan/); the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team alone having worked in more than thirty countries (http://eaaf.typepad.com/eaaf_countries/).

'Armenian stuff' isn't any more or less 'cool' than it used to be, but when the site was found, an opportunity arose and a licence to excavate obtained; we can't just wander up and start digging holes everywhere.

Now, if you continue to speak without reading or listening or, having done so, without addressing the facts of the matter, it really would be pointless continuing the "conversation".

I've answered every empty query you've made and you've ignored every answer I've given and every piece of evidence I've presented; you've even managed to ignore the facts presented in those few sources you do occasionally use.

I don't know what you have against David Gaunt, or me, or archaeologists in general, or facts, but it really is quite tiresome. It could have been interesting and informative, but, well, it hasn't, has it?

[1.5 million]

Samarkeolog - Please thank Prof Gaunt for his good work on this issue for us. I assure you, his efforts are not unapreciated. As a result of Prof Gaunt's and others' inquiry we look forward to more revelations that perhaps may someday bring international pressure on Turkey to come clean on this and perhaps other similar sights and regarding this (Armenian Genocide) issue in general...one day, perhaps...in the meantime every effort helps and we certainly shouldn't be dismissing anything out of hand and for petty personal reasons and such...likewise we are appreciative of all efforts such as this to publiscize this sort of thing (Armenian Genocide and desecration of Armenian properties, sacred sights and in general obscuring the memory and historical record and such) through direct observation on the ground in Anatolia and surounding areas. It is such a shame that there is at least one doing some fine work in this area who can't seem to relate well enough to others to enable him to properly pass on the results of his good work and share and contribute in a proper academic environment. That he is knowledgeble and has researched and obseved much is all well and good - but if he cannot pass on this knowledge it is pretty useless - and it is certainly not useful that he feels the need to denigrate the work of others - even if it is not as in-depth as some of what he is managing in certain areas - it does not deserve such critique - particularly when the critic often cannot seem to manage to convey much of his own own observations in any kind of positve and useful manner. Shame that. Likewise there is no monopoly to knowledge (or insight) and any who would hink so is seriously mistaken.

[Joseph]

Samarkeolog - Please thank Prof Gaunt for his good work on this issue for us. I assure you, his efforts are not unapreciated. As a result of Prof Gaunt's and others' inquiry we look forward to more revelations that perhaps may someday bring international pressure on Turkey to come clean on this and perhaps other similar sights and regarding this (Armenian Genocide) issue in general...one day, perhaps...in the meantime every effort helps and we certainly shouldn't be dismissing anything out of hand and for petty personal reasons and such...likewise we are appreciative of all efforts such as this to publiscize this sort of thing (Armenian Genocide and desecration of Armenian properties, sacred sights and in general obscuring the memory and historical record and such) through direct observation on the ground in Anatolia and surounding areas. It is such a shame that there is at least one doing some fine work in this area who can't seem to relate well enough to others to enable him to properly pass on the results of his good work and share and contribute in a proper academic environment. That he is knowledgeble and has researched and obseved much is all well and good - but if he cannot pass on this knowledge it is pretty useless - and it is certainly not useful that he feels the need to denigrate the work of others - even if it is not as in-depth as some of what he is managing in certain areas - it does not deserve such critique - particularly when the critic often cannot seem to manage to convey much of his own own observations in any kind of positve and useful manner. Shame that. Likewise there is no monopoly to knowledge (or insight) and any who would hink so is seriously mistaken.

I agree. Good post 1.5

[samarkeolog]

Thanks. I know - and I'm sure he understands - that his work is appreciated and we all hope that our common efforts will eventually achieve something concrete. We just have to keep trying - and trying together.

[bell-the-cat]

In the Turkish Daily News article, they noted that, 'On examining the grave, Gaunt refused to collaborate with the Turkish historians. It had been tampered with since it was first uncovered, making it impossible to conclusively establish its origins or the circumstances of the human remains.'

They relayed that: 'It could well be a Roman grave, he [David Gaunt] said, but the point was to examine the remains of 38 bodies there and that is now difficult if not impossible.'

Why do you refuse to read what has been written or to recognise and address it in your comments?

It is you who refuses to read what was written.

My comments relating to Gaunt were not directed at what he said on visiting the site in April 2007, but what he claimed in October 2006 without having seen the site. No credible archaeologist would have made such claims without having first examined the evidence in person.

[samarkeolog]

If we're talking solely about autumn 2006, I can better understand your concern, but his presumption was based photographic evidence (of a mass of material that, even if we completely disregard any of its placing, because of villagers' disturbance of some of the remains, it was still so great an amount that it would not have come from a Roman family tomb) and it was interpreted in light of historical accounts - eyewitness testimony - of at least part of the massacre and the dumping of the 120 Syriacs/Assyrians in a well.

It's possible that it was the newspapers' rendering of more detailed, more careful statements that made him appear presumptuous. Elsewhere, he said (later, but of the opinions he gave in autumn 2006, with my emphases):

A few photographs were taken and Ülkede Özgür Gündem wrote an article as did the journal Nokta. Both interviewed me on my opinion as I had written a book about massacres in this region. I suggested that the mass grave might be that of the victims of one of several massacres documented by contemporaries. There was documentation of killings of people taken from nearby Dara, Nusaybin, and Mardin as well as of the last remnants of a deportation column that had started in Erzurum. The sparsely settled area where the mass grave had been discovered is on the line of ancient defence works and underground storage rooms dating back to Roman times. It was turned into a killing field during the summer of 1915. With great probability the cave should contain Armenian, but with some likelihood also Assyrian-Syrian and Khaldean, victims. But only a site investigation could tell.

(Moreover, in the 3rd of March 2007 Armenian Reporter article, discussing the autumn 2006 period, (again, with my emphasis) it said that: 'Prof. David Gaunt... gave several interviews to the Turkish media, arguing that the remains may belong to Assyrians, Chaldeans, or Armenians. Mr. Gaunt based his argument on the historical incidents known to have happened in that area, and added that only a site investigation could determine the provenance of the bodies'.)

[bell-the-cat]

If we're talking solely about autumn 2006, I can better understand your concern, but his presumption was based photographic evidence (of a mass of material that, even if we completely disregard any of its placing, because of villagers' disturbance of some of the remains, it was still so great an amount that it would not have come from a Roman family tomb) and it was interpreted in light of historical accounts - eyewitness testimony - of at least part of the massacre and the dumping of the 120 Syriacs/Assyrians in a well.

It's possible that it was the newspapers' rendering of more detailed, more careful statements that made him appear presumptuous. Elsewhere, he said (later, but of the opinions he gave in autumn 2006, with my emphases):

A few photographs were taken and Ülkede Özgür Gündem wrote an article as did the journal Nokta. Both interviewed me on my opinion as I had written a book about massacres in this region. I suggested that the mass grave might be that of the victims of one of several massacres documented by contemporaries. There was documentation of killings of people taken from nearby Dara, Nusaybin, and Mardin as well as of the last remnants of a deportation column that had started in Erzurum. The sparsely settled area where the mass grave had been discovered is on the line of ancient defence works and underground storage rooms dating back to Roman times. It was turned into a killing field during the summer of 1915. With great probability the cave should contain Armenian, but with some likelihood also Assyrian-Syrian and Khaldean, victims. But only a site investigation could tell.

(Moreover, in the 3rd of March 2007 Armenian Reporter article, discussing the autumn 2006 period, (again, with my emphasis) it said that: 'Prof. David Gaunt... gave several interviews to the Turkish media, arguing that the remains may belong to Assyrians, Chaldeans, or Armenians. Mr. Gaunt based his argument on the historical incidents known to have happened in that area, and added that only a site investigation could determine the provenance of the bodies'.)

That just proves he is doing some backtracking. But the damage was already done. He publicised the site in international media, inviting its destruction. He politicised the site's contents by making hasty comments on a sensitive subject without having any proof to back up his allegations. And he did it out of self-interest to publicise his book. I'm not surprised people like 1.5 like him, he recognises a kindred spirit.

[samarkeolog]

According to the Investigative Journalists of Armenia (HETQ Online), before it was publicised:

The Xirabebaba residents assumed they had uncovered a mass grave of 300 Armenian villagers massacred during the Genocide of 1915. They informed Akarsu Gendarmerie headquarters, the local military unit, about the discovered cave. Turkish army officers, according to Ülkede Özgür Gündem, instructed the villagers to blockade the cave entrance and make no mention about the skeletons.

Then (with my emphases):

As the mass burial made news, local gendarmerie made another visit to the villagers. The latter were pressed to report the name of the person who leaked the mass burial discovery to the press. The officers told the villagers that the news reported by Roj TV, an international Kurdish satellite television, and Ülkede Özgür Gündem were “all lies.” The villagers were warned not to show the way to the cave to anybody.

The victims of the mass grave, according to Södertörn University History Professor David Gaunt, are most likely the 150 Armenian and 120 Syriac males, heads of their families, from the nearby town of Dara (now Oguz) killed on June 14, 1915.

Not Gaunt, but journalists who were seeking to publicise the site - and that in order to educate the public - sought his opinion as an expert on the subject.

It was only '[a]fter the case had received attention in both the media and the Swedish parliament, [that] the Turkish authority was forced to allow a visit to the grave'. So, without media pressure, later including Gaunt's contributions, the limited documentation we have been able to produce, secure and publicise would not exist and there would be little or no evidence with which to counter the historical lies of the denialists. Science undermines denial. Science is necessary to disprove denialist lies.

The ESNA judged that:

The Turkish authorities' recent actions can be compared to nothing other than the actions of a criminal, cleaning up all traces of his crime. When the Turkish authorities were forced to open the grave, they also, at the same time, decided to remove all the skeletons from the site.

For corroborating scientific opinion of the material you thought insufficient evidence, we may look at forensic medical commentary (with my emphases). Towards the end of last year, Assyria Times reported that:

In the last issue of the magazine NOKTA publishes an article about the mass grave and interviews the chairman of the forensic medical faculty at Istanbul University, Prof. Sebnem Korur Financı. Financı says that if Turkey is ready to face its history, the discovery of the mass grave and the genocide against the Assyrians during the First World War must be discussed without prejudice.

Furthermore Financi says: So far, the authorities’ unwillingness to listen, to see and to speak about the question has been an attempt to keep this from spreading so that nobody will know anything about the genocide. Actually, this mass grave gives us an invaluable occasion to release ourselves from today's and yesterdays' dark history, which otherwise will overshadow the tomorrow.

So, he wasn't backtracking: he judged it most likely a mass grave, but also that investigation was necessary to prove one way or another.

The damage had not already been done, at least not by him: the site was already being publicised in the media and if it had not been, there would have been no public knowledge of or evidence about it. The army knew of the site and, as is evident from their treatment of other mass graves - and their massive control of this one in itself - suggest, they had an interest in its documentation; to be more precise, they had an interest in stopping its documentation.

Archaeologists and forensic scientists agreed on the interpretation of the, albeit limited, but still convincing, material available early on.

The people buried in this grave were probably Armenians, but Gaunt's book is on Assyrians, Chaldeans and Syrian Christians' genocide; I accept that when you try to investigate and document a site and it is destroyed to erase the evidence, you will become better known, even if it's not covering the same events, but if we were to follow your logic, we would have to go so far as to say that he wanted the site's destruction (because a normal excavation wouldn't've drawn much or any attention).

He's devoted his efforts to documenting genocide and educating people about it; if you're going to question his motives, you should question the motives of anyone who gets paid for their labour (which you may well do, but you should remember that there are far quicker, easier, more lucrative ways to do what you're accusing him of, without working on anything in Turkey, let alone work on a genocide, the occurrence of which is still denied). If he were the kind of person you seem to suggest he is - someone who would exploit the Armenian Genocide, the politics, etc., for his own ends - he wouldn't "waste" his time, money and energy studying it.

[Joseph]

According to the Investigative Journalists of Armenia (HETQ Online), before it was publicised:

The Xirabebaba residents assumed they had uncovered a mass grave of 300 Armenian villagers massacred during the Genocide of 1915. They informed Akarsu Gendarmerie headquarters, the local military unit, about the discovered cave. Turkish army officers, according to Ülkede Özgür Gündem, instructed the villagers to blockade the cave entrance and make no mention about the skeletons.

Then (with my emphases):

As the mass burial made news, local gendarmerie made another visit to the villagers. The latter were pressed to report the name of the person who leaked the mass burial discovery to the press. The officers told the villagers that the news reported by Roj TV, an international Kurdish satellite television, and Ülkede Özgür Gündem were “all lies.” The villagers were warned not to show the way to the cave to anybody.

The victims of the mass grave, according to Södertörn University History Professor David Gaunt, are most likely the 150 Armenian and 120 Syriac males, heads of their families, from the nearby town of Dara (now Oguz) killed on June 14, 1915.

Not Gaunt, but journalists who were seeking to publicise the site - and that in order to educate the public - sought his opinion as an expert on the subject.

It was only '[a]fter the case had received attention in both the media and the Swedish parliament, [that] the Turkish authority was forced to allow a visit to the grave'. So, without media pressure, later including Gaunt's contributions, the limited documentation we have been able to produce, secure and publicise would not exist and there would be little or no evidence with which to counter the historical lies of the denialists. Science undermines denial. Science is necessary to disprove denialist lies.

The ESNA judged that:

The Turkish authorities' recent actions can be compared to nothing other than the actions of a criminal, cleaning up all traces of his crime. When the Turkish authorities were forced to open the grave, they also, at the same time, decided to remove all the skeletons from the site.

For corroborating scientific opinion of the material you thought insufficient evidence, we may look at forensic medical commentary (with my emphases). Towards the end of last year, Assyria Times reported that:

In the last issue of the magazine NOKTA publishes an article about the mass grave and interviews the chairman of the forensic medical faculty at Istanbul University, Prof. Sebnem Korur Financı. Financı says that if Turkey is ready to face its history, the discovery of the mass grave and the genocide against the Assyrians during the First World War must be discussed without prejudice.

Furthermore Financi says: So far, the authorities’ unwillingness to listen, to see and to speak about the question has been an attempt to keep this from spreading so that nobody will know anything about the genocide. Actually, this mass grave gives us an invaluable occasion to release ourselves from today's and yesterdays' dark history, which otherwise will overshadow the tomorrow.

So, he wasn't backtracking: he judged it most likely a mass grave, but also that investigation was necessary to prove one way or another.

The damage had not already been done, at least not by him: the site was already being publicised in the media and if it had not been, there would have been no public knowledge of or evidence about it. The army knew of the site and, as is evident from their treatment of other mass graves - and their massive control of this one in itself - suggest, they had an interest in its documentation; to be more precise, they had an interest in stopping its documentation.

Archaeologists and forensic scientists agreed on the interpretation of the, albeit limited, but still convincing, material available early on.

The people buried in this grave were probably Armenians, but Gaunt's book is on Assyrians, Chaldeans and Syrian Christians' genocide; I accept that when you try to investigate and document a site and it is destroyed to erase the evidence, you will become better known, even if it's not covering the same events, but if we were to follow your logic, we would have to go so far as to say that he wanted the site's destruction (because a normal excavation wouldn't've drawn much or any attention).

He's devoted his efforts to documenting genocide and educating people about it; if you're going to question his motives, you should question the motives of anyone who gets paid for their labour (which you may well do, but you should remember that there are far quicker, easier, more lucrative ways to do what you're accusing him of, without working on anything in Turkey, let alone work on a genocide, the occurrence of which is still denied). If he were the kind of person you seem to suggest he is - someone who would exploit the Armenian Genocide, the politics, etc., for his own ends - he wouldn't "waste" his time, money and energy studying it.

Once again, thank you for the very concise and detailed explanation.

[1.5 million]

I'm not surprised people like 1.5 like him, he recognises a kindred spirit.

LOL - yeah - I identify with someone who actually has a real job and works for a living