FreezBee
February 15th 2006, 01:38 PM
Hi!
I tried to enter the entire post at one time, but that was too big a lump tor the TWeb to chew :smile:
So I'll do it over a few rounds - stay tuned for the next edition!
Note: references to ANET are to JamesB. Pritchard, ed.: Ancient Near Eastern Texts relating to the Old Testament, 3. edition, Princeton, 1969.
In the Old Testament, e.g. in Genesis 23, there are references to hty, usually tanslated Hittites. But who, if they ever existed, were these hty? The radical critics descending from the age of enlightenment claimed that they were pure fantasy, but after the discovery in 1906 of the ruins of Hattusas, the capital of Hatti land, the Hittite empire, things have changed. But Hebron is a far way from Anatolia and northern Syria, the extent of the original Hittite empire.
The Hittite empire comprised several minor states, and we have preserved some of the vassalage treatities between the Hittite kings and their cassal kings. In such a treaty between the Hittite king Mursilis II (14th century bce) amd king Duppi-Teshub of Amurru, Mursilis describes himself like this (ANET, p. 203):
These are the words of the Sun Mursilis, the great king, the king of the Hatti land, the valiant, the favorite of the Storm-god, the son of Suppiluliumas, the great king, the king of the Hatti kand, the valiant.
In the 12th century bce the Hittite empire was run down by Aegean peoples wrecking havoc in the entire eastern Mediterranean, but a group of city-states in northern Syria retained the name of Hatti - presumably because they had no other common name. The precise political organization of these city-states is not known.
More to come!
- FreezBee
Seeing that I cannot edit the OP anymore, I'll have to continue in a new post :shrug:
Picking up from the city-states in northern Syria that retained the name of Hatti after the fall of the original Hittite empire.
From an inscription of the Assyrian king Ashurnasirpal II (883-859 bce) we learn (ANET, p. 275):
I departed from the country Bit-Adini and crossed the Euphrates at the peak of its flood by means of rafts made bouyant with inflated goatskin bottles. I advanced towards Carchemish. There I received from himself the tribute of Sangara, the king of the Hittites, amounting to: 20 talents of silver, [and so on].
Here Sangara, who is clearly king of Carchemish, is desvribed as "king of the Hittites". This might imply that he was some kind of over-king of the citu-states that at this time made up the Hatti land. But it may of course also only reflect Assyrian mis-conceptions of the political organization.
Also Sargon II (721-705 bce) has the Hittites still living in Syria (ANET, p. 285):
Ia'ubidi from Hamath, a commoner without claim to the throne, a cursed Hittite, schemed to become king of Hamath, induced the cities Arvad, Simirra, Damascus and Samaria to desert me, made them collaborate and fitted out an army.
We know the end of that whole story. And also what followed. Hamath is a city by the Orontes river, and we cannot know if people as far south as Samaria were called Hittites at this time.
Sargon's son and successor, Sennacherib (704-681 bce), continues where his father left (ANET, p. 287):
In my third campaign I marched against Hatti. Luli, ling of Sidon, whom the terror-inspiring glamor of my lordship overwhelmed, fled far overseas and perished.
This is still Syria, but at least the next king, Esarhaddon (680-669 bce) uses the name for a pretty large area (ANET, p. 291):
I called up the kings of the country Hatti and (of the region) on the other side of the river Euphrates) to wit; Ba'lu, king of Tyre, Manasseh, king of Judah, [...] - 12 kings from the seacoast, [...] - 10 kings from Cyprus amidst the sea; together 22 kings of Hatti, the seashore and the islands;
Here Hatti is the region "on the other side of the river", which comprises "the seashore and the islands" - the seashore all the way down to Judah.
Yet more to come!
- FreezBee
Third and last part!
Continuing from Esarhaddon's mustering of kings.
An inscription relating events during the last year of king Nabopolassar of Babylon, the father of Nebuchadnezzar (The king of Akkad) tells us this from (ANET, p. 564):
Year 7, month Kislimu: The king of Akkad moved his army into Hatti land, laid siege to the city of Judah, and the king took the city on the second day of the month Addaru. He appointed a (new) king of his liking, took heavy booty from it and brought it into Babylon.
Even the Seleucid kings, while they were residing in Babylon, could speak of Hatti land. Here from a text of Antiochus I Soter (280-262 bce) (ANET, p. 317):
I am Antiochus, the great king, the legitimate king, the king of the world, king of Babylon, king of all countries, the caretaker of the temples Esagila and Ezida, the first-born son of king Seleucus, the Macedonian, king of Babylon.
When I conceived the idea of (re)constructing Esagila and Ezida, I formed with my august hands when I was still in the country Hatti [= Syria] the first brick for Esagila and Ezida with the finest oil and brought it with me for the laying of the foundation of Esagila and Ezida. And in the month of Addaru, the 2oth day, the 43rd year (of the Seleucid era), I did lay the foundation of Ezida, the (only) true temple of Nebo which is in Borsippa.
To cut it short, the name of Hatti was in use long after the fall of the Hittite empire, and the hty in the Old Testament need therefore not refer to any specific people, but may simply mean the natives in the Syro-Palestinian area, just as Cana'anites.
Thanks for reading :flowers:
- FreezBee
I tried to enter the entire post at one time, but that was too big a lump tor the TWeb to chew :smile:
So I'll do it over a few rounds - stay tuned for the next edition!
Note: references to ANET are to JamesB. Pritchard, ed.: Ancient Near Eastern Texts relating to the Old Testament, 3. edition, Princeton, 1969.
In the Old Testament, e.g. in Genesis 23, there are references to hty, usually tanslated Hittites. But who, if they ever existed, were these hty? The radical critics descending from the age of enlightenment claimed that they were pure fantasy, but after the discovery in 1906 of the ruins of Hattusas, the capital of Hatti land, the Hittite empire, things have changed. But Hebron is a far way from Anatolia and northern Syria, the extent of the original Hittite empire.
The Hittite empire comprised several minor states, and we have preserved some of the vassalage treatities between the Hittite kings and their cassal kings. In such a treaty between the Hittite king Mursilis II (14th century bce) amd king Duppi-Teshub of Amurru, Mursilis describes himself like this (ANET, p. 203):
These are the words of the Sun Mursilis, the great king, the king of the Hatti land, the valiant, the favorite of the Storm-god, the son of Suppiluliumas, the great king, the king of the Hatti kand, the valiant.
In the 12th century bce the Hittite empire was run down by Aegean peoples wrecking havoc in the entire eastern Mediterranean, but a group of city-states in northern Syria retained the name of Hatti - presumably because they had no other common name. The precise political organization of these city-states is not known.
More to come!
- FreezBee
Seeing that I cannot edit the OP anymore, I'll have to continue in a new post :shrug:
Picking up from the city-states in northern Syria that retained the name of Hatti after the fall of the original Hittite empire.
From an inscription of the Assyrian king Ashurnasirpal II (883-859 bce) we learn (ANET, p. 275):
I departed from the country Bit-Adini and crossed the Euphrates at the peak of its flood by means of rafts made bouyant with inflated goatskin bottles. I advanced towards Carchemish. There I received from himself the tribute of Sangara, the king of the Hittites, amounting to: 20 talents of silver, [and so on].
Here Sangara, who is clearly king of Carchemish, is desvribed as "king of the Hittites". This might imply that he was some kind of over-king of the citu-states that at this time made up the Hatti land. But it may of course also only reflect Assyrian mis-conceptions of the political organization.
Also Sargon II (721-705 bce) has the Hittites still living in Syria (ANET, p. 285):
Ia'ubidi from Hamath, a commoner without claim to the throne, a cursed Hittite, schemed to become king of Hamath, induced the cities Arvad, Simirra, Damascus and Samaria to desert me, made them collaborate and fitted out an army.
We know the end of that whole story. And also what followed. Hamath is a city by the Orontes river, and we cannot know if people as far south as Samaria were called Hittites at this time.
Sargon's son and successor, Sennacherib (704-681 bce), continues where his father left (ANET, p. 287):
In my third campaign I marched against Hatti. Luli, ling of Sidon, whom the terror-inspiring glamor of my lordship overwhelmed, fled far overseas and perished.
This is still Syria, but at least the next king, Esarhaddon (680-669 bce) uses the name for a pretty large area (ANET, p. 291):
I called up the kings of the country Hatti and (of the region) on the other side of the river Euphrates) to wit; Ba'lu, king of Tyre, Manasseh, king of Judah, [...] - 12 kings from the seacoast, [...] - 10 kings from Cyprus amidst the sea; together 22 kings of Hatti, the seashore and the islands;
Here Hatti is the region "on the other side of the river", which comprises "the seashore and the islands" - the seashore all the way down to Judah.
Yet more to come!
- FreezBee
Third and last part!
Continuing from Esarhaddon's mustering of kings.
An inscription relating events during the last year of king Nabopolassar of Babylon, the father of Nebuchadnezzar (The king of Akkad) tells us this from (ANET, p. 564):
Year 7, month Kislimu: The king of Akkad moved his army into Hatti land, laid siege to the city of Judah, and the king took the city on the second day of the month Addaru. He appointed a (new) king of his liking, took heavy booty from it and brought it into Babylon.
Even the Seleucid kings, while they were residing in Babylon, could speak of Hatti land. Here from a text of Antiochus I Soter (280-262 bce) (ANET, p. 317):
I am Antiochus, the great king, the legitimate king, the king of the world, king of Babylon, king of all countries, the caretaker of the temples Esagila and Ezida, the first-born son of king Seleucus, the Macedonian, king of Babylon.
When I conceived the idea of (re)constructing Esagila and Ezida, I formed with my august hands when I was still in the country Hatti [= Syria] the first brick for Esagila and Ezida with the finest oil and brought it with me for the laying of the foundation of Esagila and Ezida. And in the month of Addaru, the 2oth day, the 43rd year (of the Seleucid era), I did lay the foundation of Ezida, the (only) true temple of Nebo which is in Borsippa.
To cut it short, the name of Hatti was in use long after the fall of the Hittite empire, and the hty in the Old Testament need therefore not refer to any specific people, but may simply mean the natives in the Syro-Palestinian area, just as Cana'anites.
Thanks for reading :flowers:
- FreezBee