This Ancient City May Have Been Ruled by Women, DNA Reveals

[Judi Lynn]

By Ashley Fike
July 3, 2025, 1:08pm

At first glance, Çatalhöyük looks like any other archaeological marvel. Tightly packed homes. No roads. No temples. Just walls, bones, and the occasional fertility figurine. But new DNA evidence from this 9,000-year-old proto-city in central Turkey is totally changing what we thought we knew about early society.

According to a new study in Science, most of the people buried together at the site were related through their mothers. That may sound simple, but it hints at a social structure where women stayed rooted in their homes while men moved between them. It’s called matrilocality, and it’s the kind of thing that challenges long-held assumptions about who held power in the ancient world.

Researchers analyzed genomes from 131 people buried in 35 houses over hundreds of years. What they found was way more than family history. It was a glimpse into a system that favored maternal lines and possibly elevated the role of women in everyday life.

This 9,000-Year-Old City May Have Been Ruled by Women, DNA Reveals
“It seems that people moving among buildings are adult males, whereas people residing in them are adult females,” said Mehmet Somel, one of the study’s co-leads.

This wasn’t some fleeting anomaly. The pattern held steady for over a thousand years, even as other aspects of the society evolved. Early households were built around an extended family. Later ones showed looser ties, suggesting practices like fostering or adoption. But even then, the maternal connections stayed strong.

More:
https://www.vice.com/en/article/this-ancient-city-may-have-been-ruled-by-women-dna-reveals/