Searching for matriarchal societies in prehistory, relying on the findings of burial sites in Southwest Asia

Today, some scholars believe in which a matriarchal structure, hereditary succession is traced to a matrilineality line. The residence is matrilocal and all the essentials’ items are in the hands of women. But today we live in societies with the patriarchal and androcentric structure. Some feminist scholars believe that if a matriarchy society existed in prehistory, it may be possible to hope for the end of today's patriarchal structure. Various materials and deposits such as skeletal data and grave goods can be used to search for women, their way of life and their status in the past. With the help of research on women’s burial and how it is done in a burial site and with the help of the findings of the graves; hypotheses can be made as to the existence or absence of a matriarchal structure in that society. In this article, with the help of library research, we give a brief history of the emergence of the hypothesis of matriarchal societies and some of its features. Then, with a descriptive-analytical method and using field research conducted, we express the interpretations obtained from the findings in some burial sites in Southwest Asia. The findings indicate that there should not consider just one form of structure for all prehistoric societies in this region, and on the other hand, with all the research done in this field, there is still no firm and conclusive findings about the existence of matriarchal societies in the prehistoric area of Southwest Asia.