Wikipedia of sorts maybe? I can imagine that, somehow their collective knowledge was gathered in such images. Why not? At least to some extent it is probably correct.

I do not know why these megaliths would have anything to do with other expressions that you happily clump together into the category “totem pole”.

I question your notion that these decorated pillars are better compared to Native American totem poles than to carved columns in a Gothic cathedral or whatever else you may compare with. Should we also consider cathedral pillars as totem poles or should we consider that a gargoyle and an eagle head may symbolize very different things? Is a pantocrator the same as a hieroglyph? Is the Venus of Mile the same as the Venus of Lespulgues?

Totem poles are specific of NW North American Natives, shamanism is specific of Siberian peoples and other practices that only vaguely resemble them cannot use the name at risk of extreme confusion.

In the absence of knowledge and understanding of the true religious practises and traditions of the people who built Göbekli Tepe, how can you say there is no doubt? Until facts indicate otherwise, there is always doubt. ‘Feeling’ that it’s a religious site is one thing. Knowing it is quite another.

“no place can compare to GT. After leaving there we really felt like we’d visited or taken part in something significant”

– sometimes feelings are more important than conjecture.

There is obviously far more to this site than has been mentioned in the official reports.
And there seems to be much more yet to be excavated.

PS I don’t think ‘tau’ cross can be applied to these pillars, as the ‘tau’ was essentially a Greek symbol of a much later date and was tapered, not square? So any pre-conceived ideas about ‘crosses’ need to be put to one side, I think.

I have, in march 2010, and there is no doubt that it is a religious site. The pilars, The carvings and The main complex at least give some hope for explanation as to their function and usage. But noone seems to be able to give any clue as to The many football sized round carvings in The ground at The bottom, or entrance, to The complex. To The large basins(?) That are at The same location. And The Even more mysterious carvings with an appearant altar and flowing grooves also in The rockface some hundred meters lower than The temple!

I have been to several of The historic cultural gathering sites in western europe, in egypt, greece, England, turkey and Syria, but no place can compare to GT. After leaving there we really felt like we’d visited or taken part in something significant.

The city of sanliurfa, urfa, closest to GT claims after Local traditions to be The place where Abraham was born, there is a large abrahamittic cultus in The area, absolutly facinating! You would recognize so many of The myths/stories from The old testament. Even Local tales tell that after The flood Noah ended his journey here, that GT is mount arrarat. Thus explaining, in This tradition The presens of The extencive fauna reliefs on GT.

And The mulbery tree…. Epic!

JMP:
Edgar Cayce specifically said that Atlantis would reemerge in the Carribean.

Anyhow the swastika or lauburu is probably older and I remember being it mentioned already in Gravettian contexts and appears again in Samarra culture platters soon after, where the arms of the cross are antelopes, maybe orices. The regular, static, cross appears also in the Neolithic of that area, in Tell Halaf culture (same area as GT, but some time later). T shapes in symbols appear later in the Aegean either as speculated “anchors” or as the famous double axe. But I would not say that T symbols and + symbols are the same concept, at least not necessarily so and I know of no reason to think so (except the Christian hybrid variant, which is just a peculiar late development but is probably what brought you to make that association, Avia, right?)

You are defining here what these people can believe or not. You seem to have preconceptions about the timeline of religious evolution and these “totems” (????) do not match your scheme. That is what I am criticizing.

“Totem poles (upright carved logs, stone pillars) are common among pre-agriculture peoples”…

AFAIK they are/were only common in some areas of North America, specifically among the Chinook and culturally related peoples. There are no totem poles among any other know culture anywhere on Earth.