"A winding lava-tube cavern in northern Saudi Arabia was home to hyenas for millennia, and they left behind plenty of gruesome evidence of past meals. The floor of the cave system was covered in deep piles of gnawed bones — some of which belonged to people. " Source: Live Science.
"Hyenas often scavenge their meals, so they probably didn't kill their human prey, but rather, dug up cadavers from nearby burials and devoured them in this underground den, scientists recently reported."
"Other researchers described the western part of the lava tube site in 2009 as the 'Wolf Den,' because they suspected that wolves were responsible for the vast collection of bones. However, new analysis of the bone piles, coprolites (preserved feces) and individual bones told a different story. Scientists now suspect that the den belonged to striped hyenas (Hyaena hyaena), which fed on a variety of animals — including humans — in that location from at least 4,500 years ago until as recently as 150 years ago."
"Archaeologists in Turkey have discovered 400 rock-cut chamber tombs that date to 1,800 years ago and make up part of one of the largest rock-cut chamber tomb necropolises in the world." Source: Live Science.
"The team found the tombs in the ancient city of Blaundos (also spelled Blaundus), located about 110 miles (180 kilometers) east of the Aegean Sea in what is now Turkey. The city was founded during the time of Alexander the Great and existed through the Roman and Byzantine periods."
The Neolithic site of Gobekli Tepe, founded in the 10th millennium BC, is thought to be the world's oldest temple. Located near the modern city of Urfa, aka Sanliurfa, in southeastern Turkey, Gobekli Tepe was part of a network of the first human settlements where the agricultural revolution took place, according to Wikipedia.
"The region of these settlements is named 'Taş Tepeler,' literally meaning Stone Hills," according to ArkeoNews. "Covering an area of 200 kilometers from one end to the other, Taş Tepeler is an Anatolian and Upper Mesopotamian territory that hosted the earliest settled communities.
"Taş Tepeler features 12 main sites including Göbeklitepe. Some seven of these big and small sites are now excavation sites that will shed light on a crucial yet little-known period of history."
One of the smaller sites is Sefer Tepe. (The word "tepe" means "mound" or "hill.")
I haven't been able to find much information on Sefertepe other than the fact that it's a small Neolithic site with 16 T-shaped cultic pillars. Remains of a settlement have been found on the site and Sefertepe may have been a cult center for nearby settlements.
The T-shaped pillars at Sefertepe are similar to the larger pillars found at Gobekli Tepe. As described in the video above, these pillars are a characteristic feature of these settlements. According to a 2016 article by the Gobekli Tepe Research Project, "Several more sites in the near vicinity of Göbekli – Sefer Tepe, Karahan, and Hamzan Tepe – are known to have similar pillars, but no excavation work has been carried out so far." Some of the older pillars at Gobekli Tepe itself weigh tons and archaeologists believe that the T-shape is an abstract depiction of the human body seen from the side:
"Evidence for this interpretation are the low relief depictions of arms, hands and items of clothing like belts and loinclothes on some of the pillars. Often the pillars bear further reliefs, mostly depictions of animals, but also of numerous abstract symbols."
Next video describes a T-shaped pillar discovered at a site known as Kurt Tepesi.
These pillars definitely had some kind of cultural/religious significance for the Stone Age people who lived in the region:
"The T-shaped limestone pillars found in Göbeklitepe are older than the invention of agriculture and are one of the first manifestations of human-made monumental architecture. The monuments, decorated with depictions of wild animals, geometrical figures, and a few abstract depictions of humans, are believed to have been used in social events and rituals." ArkeoNews.
Karahan Tepe, a fairly large settlement, is often called the sister site of Gobekli Tepe, according to Wikipedia.
"Karahantepe houses more than 250 T-shaped megaliths featuring animal depictions. Stelae with human depictions and three-dimensional human sculptures were also found in the site, which distinguishes it from Göbeklitepe." (ArkeoNews)
This is an extremely ancient and mysterious region. According to ArkeoNews, "As far as we know, Taş Tepeler is the first example of sedentism [settled living] and social union on earth. In Taş Tepeler, human beings experimented with examples of organized labor and specialization for the first time." The stoneworking techniques used at these sites shows a degree of sophistication, imagination and artistic ability that you wouldn't expect to find in Stone Age hunter-gatherers making the transition to agriculture.
A small but important satellite settlement is the site of Harbetsuvan. This is one of the Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPN) sites in the region:
"PPN villages consisted of clusters of stone or mud brick houses, and sometimes substantial monumental or 'communal' buildings. The T-shaped pillar tradition seen at Göbekli Tepe is unique to the Urfa region, but is found at the majority of PPN sites there. These include Nevalı Çori, Hamzan Tepe, Karahan Tepe, Harbetsuvan Tepesi, Sefer Tepe, and Tash Tepe." (Wikipedia)
Nobody knows how these pillars and other structures, especially the huge stones at Gobekli Tepe, were moved and erected. And the meaning of the artwork on the pillars is a continuing enigma:
"The building of Göbeklitepe — a structure comprised of enormous columns and massive stones – is still a mystery, as instruments such as wheelbarrows, etc., did not exist. Human and pack animal labor are thought to have been employed to move and position the temple’s stones." (ArkeoNews)
"The reliefs of animal images on the columns are definitely beyond time. Göbeklitepe is an old building that demonstrates that people held systematic gatherings even when they lived as hunters, although the structure’s final purpose is unknown."
"In 1894, gold prospectors digging up a peat bog near the Russian city of Yekaterinburg unearthed something bizarre: a carved wooden idol 5 meters long. Carefully smoothed into a plank, the piece was covered front and back with recognizable human faces and hands, along with zigzag lines and other mysterious details. It also had a recognizably human head, with its mouth open in an 'o.' For more than a century, the statue was displayed as a curiosity in a Yekaterinburg museum, assumed to be at most a few thousand years old." Source: Science (2018).
"This week, a paper published in the journal Antiquity argues that the statue was crafted from a single larchwood log 11,600 years ago, making it one of the world’s oldest examples of monumental art. In age and appearance although not material, the authors write, the so-called Shigir Idol resembles the stone sculptures of Göbekli Tepe in Turkey, which are often cited as the first monumental ritual structures. Both monuments represent a leap beyond the naturalistic images of the ice age."
According to the Siberian Times (2019), "The idol has already shattered our understanding of early ritual art by the hunter-gatherers at the end of the Ice Age, all the more so when tests revealed last year proved it to be older - it was created some 11,500 or 11,600 years ago - than previously understood.
"‘According to the dendrologist Karl-Uwe Heussner, the Shigir Idol stood [on the] shore of a large Shigir paleo lake for about 20 years; then a large crack appeared in the middle, followed by a series of smaller cracks.
"The Idol fell into the water, floated for about a year, then sank to the lake's bottom and formation of peat around it began."
Video from 2017. Seems to be aimed at grade-school or ESL students.
"With the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, the country's archaeological remains face a grim future even if the extremist Islamic group decides not to loot or intentionally destroy them." Source: Live Science.
"Some news reports suggest the Taliban are already hunting for one of the country's most famous caches; the so-called 'Bactrian Treasure' is a collection of more than 20,000 artifacts, many made of gold, that were found in 2,000-year-old graves at a site called Tillya Tepe [next video] in 1978. The treasure was kept in the National Museum of Afghanistan and was on display at the presidential palace, but reports indicate that its present location is unknown."
"Other archaeological remains that could be threatened by the Taliban include Mes Aynak [next video], a Buddhist city that flourished around 1,600 years ago. The city was located along the iconic Silk Road and was used for both trade and worship; numerous ancient Buddhist monasteries and other ancient Buddhist artifacts are buried there."
"The remains of a woman believed to have been killed as a human sacrifice in her 20s as early as the 4th century have been uncovered along with a bracelet, a necklace, a vessel and animal bones, at the Wolseong Palace excavation site in Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province [South Korea], the Gyeongju National Research Institute of Cultural Heritage (GNRICH) revealed, Tuesday." Source: Korea Times.
"It is the second time that traces of what appears to be a human sacrifice have been found, following the 2017 discovery of two bodies ― a man and woman in their 50s ― some 50 centimeters away from the newly discovered skeletal remains that were uncovered in April during excavation and academic research on the western rampart. They are the first cases in Korea to be identified as possibly human sacrifice, killed in the process of building the palace between the early 4th and early 5th centuries during the early Silla period."
"Ancient DNA extracted from human bones has rewritten early Japanese history by underlining that modern day populations in Japan have a tripartite genetic origin—a finding that refines previously accepted views of a dual genomic ancestry." Source: Phys.org.
"...The Japanese archipelago has been occupied by humans for at least 38,000 years but Japan underwent rapid transformations only in the last 3,000 years, first from foraging to wet-rice farming, and then to a technologically advanced imperial state."
Video from 2015.
"The previous, long-standing hypothesis suggested that mainland Japanese populations derive dual-ancestry from the indigenous Jomon hunter-gatherer-fishers, who inhabited the Japanese archipelago from around 16,000 to 3,000 years ago, and later Yayoi farmers, who migrated from the Asian continent and lived in Japan from around 900 BC to 300 AD.
"But the 12 newly sequenced ancient Japanese genomes—which came from the bones of people living in pre- and post-farming periods—also identify a later influx of East Asian ancestry during the imperial Kofun period, which lasted from around 300 to 700 AD and which saw the emergence of political centralisation in Japan."
"Goa Gajah, or Elephant Cave, is located on the island of Bali near Ubud, in Indonesia. Built in the 9th century, it served as a sanctuary." (Wikipedia)
"...The temple is characterised by menacing faces that are carved into the stone – whose purpose is assumed to be the warding off of evil spirits. The primary figure was once thought to be an elephant, hence the nickname Elephant Cave. Other sources state that it is named after the stone statue of the Hindu God Ganesh (characterized by having the head of an elephant) located inside of the temple."
The evidence is clear that prehistoric humans hunted mammoths in what is now Siberia. This 2016 video, for instance, describes one find that dated back to almost 45,000 years ago. Butchering these huge animals must have been a difficult and time-consuming job for hunters using stone tools.
"Experts have confirmed that ancient hunters resided on Kotelny, off the coast of Yakutia, at 75°20'N 141°00'E, a remarkable 990 kilometres (615 miles) north of the Arctic Circle. Their butchering tools have been found alongside multiple bones of extinct woolly mammoths." Source: Archaeology news Network (2021).
Note: This is a very harsh and remote region, to say the least, but it must have been teeming with wildlife back in the Stone Age:
"Ymyakhtakh culture (c. 2200–1300 BC) was a Late Neolithic culture of Siberia, with a very large archaeological horizon. Its origins were in Sakha, in the Lena river basin. From there it spread both to the east and to the west."