"Aslihan Yener, assistant professor at the university of Chicago's Oriental Institute, believes that a mine and ancient mining village she has found in the central Taurus mountains of Turkey shows that TIN MINING was a well developed industry in the area as early as 2870 BC.
The mine at a site called Kestel - some 60 miles north of Tarsus, on the Mediterranean coast - has two miles of tunnels. Nearby stands the mining village of Goltepe / Göltepe, which was probably occupied by 500 to 1,000 persons more or less continuously between 3290 and 1840 BC. The site contains no evidence of copper metalurgy. It did not produce bronze; instead IT PRODUCED TIN FOR EXPORT. Yener and her colleagues have analyzed tin-rich slag from 50 crucibles discovered at Goltepe. Within the total one metric ton of metallurgical debris in the form of crucible and vitrified materials, she has excavated some that have 30 percent tin content (a high percentage) still intact in the crucible."