Hinduism has largely been called the world's oldest religion, its customs and roots dating back more than 4,000 years, while Judaism emerged around the same time, making it the world's oldest monotheistic religion. Christianity took off around 2,000 years ago. And, although it has its roots further back, scholars typically date the creation of Islam to the 7th century AD, making it the youngest of the major world religions.

       Pagan religions and animistic beliefs existed before these but researchers accept that rooted faiths only emerged once humans had cast aside their nomadic lifestyles and settled on a single piece of land.

       Discoveries at Gobekli Tepe, in southern Turkey, however, could throw that assumption on its head.

       Considered to be the world's oldest stone structure, Gobekli Tepe was built somewhere between 11,000 to 12,000 years ago.

       Analysis of the intricate complex of pillars and columns suggests that the site was once the focus of huge congregations of Stone Age hunter-gatherer tribes, assembling for "ritual purposes".

       The monument and its potentially being religion's ground zero was explored during the Smithsonian Channel's documentary, 'Secrets: Garden of Eden'.

       Here, the narrator noted: "They may represent the first step towards an organised religion - shattering the theory that religious behaviour came out of later, settled societies."

       A revolution in the way people lived is thought to have taken place at Gobekli Tepe.

       Dr Reinder Neef, a specialist in ancient plants, has studied in fine detail the remains found at the site, his findings pointing to the area as being the perfect cradle for a seismic shift in human history: the transition to crop farming.

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       Some of the most common plants extracted from the samples were grass species or cereals.

       Dr Neef told the documentary: "We have some wild cereals here like wild einkorn and wild barley.

       "And the interesting thing is that they belong to the first cereals ever cultivated by a human being."

       Einkorn is known to be one of the first species ever domesticated by humans, cultivated often enough to become totally dependent on people.

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       Plant geneticists have since matched the domesticated einkorn grown by modern farmers to wild species growing just 20 miles from Gobekli Tepe.

       The documentary explained: "It means scientists can be confident the original domestication of einkorn happened somewhere nearby."

       Comparing modern samples of einkorn with ancient strains under powerful microscopes, einkorn found at Gobekli Tepe still shows the shape of wild varieties, suggesting that it was once sewn there on a mass scale.

       While many argue that the samples may have existed after the structure was built, Dr Neef believes the process of domestication had already begun.

       He said: "They were probably experimenting with cultivation of cereals, and that is something which you can expect from people who are building such incredible monuments.

       "They were experimenting not only with stone but also with plant material."

       Natural scientists also believe that the site was blessed with a perfect grassland environment to begin humanity's experiment with plant cultivation.

       From this, they think that religions formed, as ancient peoples settled down and into an agricultural way of life.