Fuck Yeah Hittites

A blog about Ancient Anatolian and related stuff. Run by a philologist who is mainly interested in linguistics so it's actually pretty shite for doing nuanced stuff with archaeology and historiography.

[fuckyeahhittites]

Related to that last link to an article about Hittite beer culture, the Hittite word for beer is šieššar-, which I’ve never actually looked up in the Chicago Hittite Dictionary before. Apparently the entry is six pages long.

[fuckyeahhittites]

Research finds 4000-year-old Anatolian beer was very likely delicious. Andrew Masterson reports.

[theancientwayoflife]

~ Oxen and Cart.

Culture: Proto-Hittite

Date: 2000–1800 B.C.

Medium: Bronze

[fuckyeahhittites]

East wall of Chamber B depicting in a niche the God Sharruma (son of the Thunder God Teshub) embracing King Tudhaliya IV, Yazılıkaya, the Hittite sanctuary of Hattusa, Turkey (Photo by Carole Raddato via Wikimedia Commons)

[ancientart]

Portal lion, Late Hittite Period, 9th century BCE.

Courtesy & currently located at the Museum of the Ancient Orient, Istanbul, Turkey. Photos taken by Richard Mortel.

[dwellerinthelibrary]

Covered in Luwian hieroglyphs!

[fuckyeahhittites]

I was checking and referencing some stuff in the database with the HW² today. It turns out there is only one attestation of ḫaḫḫarš- ‘to laugh’, and it is: man ᵈKumarbiš ŠA ᵈAnu LÚ-natar katta pašta n=aš=za duškatta n=aš=za ḫa-aḫ-ḫar-aš-ta (KUB XXXIII 120 (+119 + XXXVI 31) I 26-27)

"When Kumarbi gobbled down Anu's manhood, he rejoiced and laughed."

Hittites, man…

[protoindoeuropean]

why normal people learn German: to communicate with people, to enjoy German literature in the original language, to discover a new culture …

why I learn German:

[fuckyeahhittites]

We break from the irregularly scheduled Anatolian posts for a personal announcement: Today I become a Doctor.

[fuckyeahhittites]

ku-iš iš-tar-ni-iš-mi an-tu-wa-aḫ-ḫi-iš a-ri ša-na-ap az-zi-kán-zi ma-a-an ú-wa-ar-kán-ta-an an-tu-uḫ-ša-an ú-wa-an-zi na-an-kán ku-na-an-zi ša-na-ap a-ta-a-an-zi “Whatever man comes among them, they eat him. If they see a fat man, they kill him and they eat him.”

KBo 3.60 ii 2-5 (via fuckyeahhittites)

[fuckyeahhittites]

Lydian-Aramaic Bilingual Inscription. Photo via Stanley E. Cook “A Lydian-Aramaic Bilingual” Journal of Hellenic Studies 37 (1917) p.78. (article on JSTOR)

[fuckyeahhittites]

Stanley A. Cook, A Lydian-Aramaic Bilingual, The Journal of Hellenic Studies, Vol. 37 (1917), pp. 77-87

Another problem of interpreting Lydian inscriptions is that there are very few bilingual texts to make sense of any of the inscriptions of non-funerary character. This is essentially the same problem with understanding Etruscan inscriptions. Basic formulaic inscriptions are pretty easy to understand and some basic aspects of grammar have been worked out on the basis of their study, but for extended inscriptions we only have precious few bilinguals where we can make educated guesses as to what individual words actually mean. 

One of the few rare bilingual texts for Lydian is a Lydian-Aramaic bilingual, and an early study of this text can be found in JHS 37 (1917).

The text of the Lydian-Aramaic bilingual is also available in the TITUS Datenbank.

[fuckyeahhittites]

This small volume of ca. 280 pages by Roberto Gusmani comprises a complete grammatical sketch, lexicon, and collection of all Lydian texts known when it was published in 1964. Gusmani published three further Ergänzungshefte (small supplementary booklets covering new inscriptions, coin legends, etc. discovered), but there really isn’t a lot of Lydian language materials preserved from antiquity.

[fuckyeahhittites]

Annick Payne, Jorit Wintjes, Lords of Asia Minor: An Introduction to the Lydians. Philippika, 93. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2016, Pp. x, 145. ISBN 9783447105682. €29.80.

A new review of a book about the Lydians. I should probably read this given that I know fuck-all about the Lydians except where they appear in Sappho and Herodotus and they’ve got loads of chariots and gold and purple ribbons and shit.

[fuckyeahhittites]

The Digital Philological-Etymological Dictionary of the Minor Ancient Anatolian Corpus Languages.

The eDiAna Project, (Digital Philological-Etymological Dictionary of the Minor Ancient Anatolian Corpus Languages) released a demo of their website last month. It’s fun to play with, and I’m looking forward to when they actually finish the project and publish the whole thing. Check it out.

[fuckyeahhittites]

The problem with maintaining this Hittite blog is that I’m mainly interested in Hittite and Anatolian linguistics and I’m just not that good at this whole material culture thing. Meanwhile, this is a medium where it is difficult to get away from images.

Maybe I should go post some translated texts or something…

[historiaantiqua]

Kuttamuwa Stele, Neo-Hittite, ca. 735 BCE

The mortuary stele of Kuttamuwa, an official of Panamuwa II of Sam’al. Written in Samali Aramaic, the 800 pound inscribed stele is notable for its reference to the “soul” being apart from the physical body and the idea that the soul lived on in the stele dedicated to the deceased person, providing valuable information about the beliefs of the people in the region during the Iron Age period in which this inscription was produced.

It was discovered by the Neubauer Expedition in a private shrine in the Neo-Hittite city of Zincirli in July 2008.

[ancientart]

Priest-King or Diety, about 1600 BC, Hittite, North Syria, basalt with bone eyes.

Courtesy & currently located at the Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio, USA. Photo taken by Daderot