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Bible Encyclopedias
Hittites
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
or
I. Old Testament Notices
1. Enumeration of Races
2. Individuals
3. Later Mention
II. History
1. Sources
2. Chronology
3. Egyptian Invasions: 18th Dynasty
4. "The Great King"
5. Egyptian Invasions: 19th Dynasty
6. Declension of Power: Aryan Invasion
7. Second Aryan Invasion
8. Assyrian Invasions
9. Invasion by Assur-nasir-pal
10. Invasions by Shalmaneser 2 and Rimmonnirari 3
11. Revolts and Invasions
12. Break-up of Hittite Power
13. Mongols in Syria
III. Language
1. Mongol Race
2. Hittire and Egyptian Monuments
3. Hair and Beard
4. Hittite Dress
5. Hittite Names
6. Vocabulary of Pterium Epistles
7. Tell el-Amarna Tablet
IV. Religion
1. Polytheism: Names of Deities
2. Religious Symbolism
V. Script
1. Cuneiform and Hieroglyphic
2. Description of Signs
3. Interpretation of Monuments
Literature
I. Old Testament Notices
1. Enumeration of Races
The "sons of Heth" are noticed 12 times and the Hittites 48 times in the Old Testament. In 21 cases the name Occurs in the enumeration of races, in Syria and Canaan, which are said (Genesis 10:6 f) to have been akin to the early inhabitants of Chaldea and Babylon. From at least 2000 bc this population is known, from monumental records, to have been partly Semitic and partly Mongolic; and the same mixed race is represented by the Hittite records recently discovered in Cappadocia and Pontus. Thus, while the Canaanites ("lowlanders"), Amorites (probably "highlanders"), Hivites ("tribesmen") and Perizzites ("rustics") bear Semitic titles, the Hittites, Jebusites and Girgashites appear to have non-Sem names. Ezekiel ( Ezekiel 16:3 , Ezekiel 16:15 ) speaks of the Jebusites as a mixed Hittite-Amorite people.
2. Individuals
The names of Hittites noticed in the Old Testament include several that are Semitic (Ahimelech, Judith, Bashemath, etc.), but others like Uriah and Beeri (Genesis 26:34 ) which are probably non-Sem. Uriah appears to have married a Hebrew wife (Bathsheba), and Esau in like manner married Hittite women (Genesis 26:34; Genesis 36:2 ). In the time of Abraham we read of Hittites as far South as Hebron (Genesis 23:3; Genesis 27:46 ), but there is no historic improbability in this at a time when the same race appears (see ZOAN ) to have ruled in the Nile Delta (but see Gray in The Expositor , May, 1898, 340 f).
3. Later Mention
In later times the "land of the Hittites" (Joshua 1:4; Judges 1:26 ) was in Syria and near the Euphrates (see TAHTIM-HODSHI ); though Uriah (2 Sam 11) lived in Jerusalem, and Ahimelech (1 Samuel 26:6 ) followed David. In the time of Solomon (1 Kings 10:29 ), the "kings of the Hittites" are mentioned with the "kings of Syria," and were still powerful a century later (2 Kings 7:6 ). Solomon himself married Hittite wives (1 Kings 11:1 ), and a few Hittites seem still to have been left in the South (2 Chronicles 8:7 ), even in his time, if not after the captivity (Ezra 9:1; Nehemiah 9:8 ).
II. History
1. Sources
The Hittites were known to the Assyrians as
2. Chronology
The chronology of the Hittites has been made clear by the notices of contemporary rulers in Babylonia, Matiene, Syria and Egypt, found by Winckler in the Hittite correspondence above noticed, and is of great importance to Bible history, because, taken in conjunction with the Tell el-Amarna Letters , with the Kassite monuments of Nippur, with the Babylonian chronicles and contemporary chronicles of Babylon and Assyria, it serves to fix the dates of the Egyptian kings of the 18th and 19th Dynasties which were previously uncertain by nearly a century, but which may now be regarded as settled within a few years. From the Tell el-Amarna Letters it is known that Thothmes 4 was contemporary with the father of Adad-nirari of Assyria (Berlin number 30), and Amenophis 4 with Burna-burias of Babylon (Brit. Mss. number 2); while a letter from Chattu-sil, the Hittite contemporary of Rameses II, was addressed to Kadashman-Turgu of Babylon on the occasion of his accession. These notices serve to show that the approximate dates given by Brugsch for the Pharaohs are more correct than those proposed by Mahler; and the following table will be useful for the understanding of the history
3. Egyptian Invasions: 18th Dynasty
The Hyksos race having been expelled from the Delta by Aahmes, the founder of the 18th (Theban) Dynasty, after 1700 bc, the great trade route through Palestine Syria was later conquered by Thothmes I, who set up a monument on the West bank of the Euphrates. The conquests of Aahmes were maintained by his successors Amenophis I and Thothmes I and II; but when Thothmes 3 attained his majority (about 1580 bc), a great league of Syrian tribes and of Canaanites, from Sharuhen near Gaza and "from the water of Egypt, as far as the land of Naharain" (Aram-naharaim), opposed this Pharaoh in his 22nd year, being led by the king of Kadesh - probably Kadesh on the Orontes (now Qedes, North of Riblah) - but they were defeated near Megiddo in Central Palestine; and in successive campaigns down to his 31st year, Thothmes 3 reconquered the Palestine plains, and all Syria to Carchemish on the Euphrates. In his 29th year, after the conquest of Tuneb (now Tennnib, West of Arpad), he mentions the tribute of the Hittites including "304 lbs in 8 rings of silver, a great piece of white precious stone, and zagu wood." They were, however, still powerful, and further wars in Syria were waged by Amenophis II, while Thothmes 4 also speaks of his first "campaign against the land of the Kheta." Adad-nirari I wrote to Egypt to say that Thothmes 4 had established his father (Bel-tiglat-Assur) as ruler of the land of Marchasse (probably Mer'ash in the extreme North of Syria), and to ask aid against the "king of the land of the Hittites." Against the increasing power of this race Thothmes 4 and his son Amenophis 3 strengthened themselves by marriage alliances with the Kassite kings of Babylon, and with the cognate rulers of Matiene, East of the Hittite lands of Syria, and Cappadocia. Dusratta of Matiene, whose sister Gilukhepa was married by Amenophis 3 in his 10th year, wrote subsequently to this Pharaoh to announce his own accession (Am Tab, Brit. Mus. number 9) and his defeat of the Hittites, sending a two-horse chariot and a young man and young woman as "spoils of the land of the Hittites."
4. "The Great King"
About this time (1480 bc) arose a great Hittite ruler bearing the strange name Subbiliuliuma, similar to that of Sapalulmi, chief the Hattinai, in North Syria, mentioned by Shalmaneser 2 in the 9th century bc. He seems to have ruled at Pterium, and calls himself "the great king, the noble king of the Hatti." He allied himself against Dusratta with Artatama, king of the Harri or North Syrians. The Syrian Hittites in Marchassi, North of the land of the Amorites, were led shortly after by Edugamma of Kinza (probably Kittiz, North of Arpad) in alliance with Aziru the Amorite, on a great raid into Phoenicia and to Bashan, South of Damascus. Thus it appears that the Amorites had only reached this region shortly before the Hebrew conquest of Bashan. Amenophis 3 repelled them in Phoenicia, and Subbiliuliuma descended on Kinza, having made a treaty with Egypt, and captured Edugamma and his father Suttatarra. He also conquered the land of Ikata which apparently lay East of the Euphrates and South of Carehemish. Some 30 years later, in the reign of Amenophis IV, Dusratta of Matiene was murdered, and his kingdom was attacked by the Assyrians; but Subbiliuliuma, though not a friend of Dusratta with whom he disputed the suzerainty of North Syria, sent aid to Dusratta's son Mattipiza, whom he set on his throne, giving him his own daughter as a wife. A little later (about 1440 bc) Aziru the Amorite, who had been subject to Amenophis III, submitted to this same great Hittite ruler, and was soon able to conquer the whole of Phoenicia down to Tyre. All the Egyptian conquests were thus lost in the latter part of the reign of Amenophis III, and in that of Amenophis IV. Only Gaza seems to have been retained, and Burna-burias of Babylon, writing to Amenophis IV, speaks of the Canaanite rebellion as beginning in the time of his father Kuri-galzu I (Am Tab, British Museum number 2), and of subsequent risings in his own time (Berlin number 7) which interrupted communication with Egypt. Assur-yuballidh of Assyria (Berlin number 9), writing to the same Pharaoh, states also that the relations with Assyria, which dated back even to the time of Assur-nadin-akhi (about 1550 bc), had ceased. About this earlier period Thothmes 3 records that he received presents from Assyria. The ruin of Egypt thus left the Hittites independent, in North Syria, about the time when - according to Old Testament chronology
5. Egyptian Invasions: 19th Dynasty
The 18th Dynasty was succeeded, about 1400 bc, or a little later, by the 19th, and Rameses I appears to have been the Pharaoh who made the treaty which Mursilis, brother of Arandas, contracted with Egypt. But on the accession of Seti I, son of Rameses I, the Syrian tribes prepared to "make a stand in the country of the Harri" against the Egyptian resolution to recover the suzerainty of their country. Seti I claims to have conquered "Kadesh (on the Orontes) in the Land of the Amorites," and it is known that Mutallis, the eldest son of Mursilis, fought against Egypt. According to his younger brother Hattusil, he was tyrant, who was finally driven out by his subjects and died before the accession of Kadashman-Turgu (about 1355 bc) in Babylon. Hattusil, the contemporary of Rameses II, then seized the throne as "great king of the Hittites" and "king of Kus" ("Cush," Genesis 2:3 ), a term which in the Akkadian language meant "the West." In his 2nd year Rameses
6. Declension of Power: Aryan Invasion
The Hittite power began now, however, to decline, in consequence of attacks from the West by hostile Aryan invaders. In the 5th year of Seti Merenptah II, son of Rameses II, these fair "peoples of the North" raided the Syrian coasts, and advanced even to Belbeis and Heliopolis in Egypt, in alliance with the Libyans West of the Delta. They were defeated, and Merenptah appears to have pursued them even to Pa-Kan'-ana near Tyre. A text of his 5th year (found by Dr. Flinders Petrie in 1896) speaks of this campaign, and says that while "Israel is spoiled" the "Hittites are quieted": for Merenptah appears to have been on good terms with them, and allowed corn to be sent in ships "to preserve the life of this people of the
7. Second Aryan Invasion
A second invasion by the Aryans occurred in the reign of Rameses 3 (about 1200 bc) when "agitation seized the peoples of the North," and "no people stood before their arms, beginning with the people of the
8. Assyrian Invasions
Half a century later (1150 bc) the Assyrians began to invade Syria, and Assur-ris-isi reached Beirût; for even as early as about 1270 bc Tukulti-Ninip of Assyria had conquered the Kassites, and had set a Semitic prince on their throne in Babylon. Early in his reign (about 1130 bc) Tiglath- pileser I claims to have subdued 42 kings, marching "to the fords of the Euphrates, the land of the
9. Invasion by Assur-Nasir-Pal
The power of the Hittites was thus broken by Assyria, yet they continued the struggle for more than 4 centuries afterward. After the defeat of Tiglath-pileser I by Marduk-nadin-akhi of Babylon (1128-1111 bc), there is a gap in Assyrian records, and we next hear of the Hittites in the reign of Assur-nasir-pal (883-858 bc); he entered Commagene, and took tribute from "the son of Bachian of the land of the
10. Invasions by Shalmaneser 2 and Rimmonnirari 3
His son Shalmaneser 2 (858-823 bc) also invaded Syria in his 1st year, and again mentions Sangara of Carchemish, with Sapalulmi of the
11. Revolts and Invasions
But the Hittites were not as yet thoroughly subdued, and often revolted. In 738 bc Tiglath-pileser 2 mentions among his tributaries a chief of the Gamgums bearing the Hittite name Tarku-lara, with Pisiris of Carchemish. In 702 bc Sennacherib passed peacefully through the "land of the
12. Breakup of Hittite Power
The power of the Hittites was thus entirely broken before Sennacherib's time, but they were not entirely exterminated, for, in 673 bc, Esar-haddon speaks of "twenty-two kings of the
13. Mongols in Syria
The power of the Mongolic race decayed gradually as that of the Semitic Assyrians increased; but even now in Syria the two races remain mingled, and Turkoman nomads still camp even as far South as the site of Kadesh on the Orontes, while a few tribes of the same stock (which entered Syria in the Middle Ages) still inhabit the plains of Sharon and Esdraelon, just as the southern Hittites dwelt among the Amorites at Jerusalem and Hebron in the days of Abraham, before they were driven north by Thothmes III.
III. Language
1. Mongol Race
The questions of race and language in early times, before the early stocks were mixed or decayed, cannot be dissociated, and we have abundant evidence of the racial type and characteristic dress of the Hittites. The late Dr. Birch of the British Museum pointed out the Mongol character of the Hittite type, and his opinion has been very generally adopted. In 1888 Dr. Sayce ( The Hittites , 15,101) calls them "Mongoloid," and says, "They had in fact, according to craniologists, the characteristics of a Mongoloid race." This was also the opinion of Sir W. Flower; and, if the Hittites were Mongols, it would appear probable that they spoke a Mongol dialect. It is also apparent that, in this case, they would be related to the old Mongol population of Chaldea (the people of Akkad and Sumir or "of the highlands and river valley") from whom the Semitic Babylonians derived their earliest civilization.
2. Hittite and Egyptian Monuments
The Hittite type is represented, not only on their own monuments, but on those of the 18th and 19th Egyptian Dynasties, including a colored picture of the time of Rameses III. The type represented has a short head and receding forehead, a prominent and sometimes rather curved nose, a strong jaw and a hairless face. The complexion is yellow, the eyes slightly slanting, the hair of the head black, and gathered into a long pigtail behind. The physiognomy is like that of the Sumerians represented on a bas-relief at Tel-loh (Zirgul) in Chaldea, and very like that of some of the Kirghiz Mongols of the present time, and of some of the more purely Mongolic Turks. The head of Gudea at Zirgul in like manner shows (about 2800 bc) the broad cheek bones and hairless face of the Turkish type; and the language of his texts, in both grammar and vocabulary, is closely similar to pure Turkish speech.
3. Hair and Beard
Among Mongolic peoples the beard grows only late in life, and among the Akkadians it is rarely represented - excepting in the case of gods and ancient kings. The great bas-relief found by Koldewey at Babylon, and representing a Hittite thunder-god with a long pigtail and (at the back) a Hittite inscription, is bearded, but the pigtailed heads on other Hittite monuments are usually hairless. At Iasili-Kaia - the rock shrine near Pterium - only the supreme god is bearded, and all the other male figures are beardless. At Ibreez, in Lycaonia, the gigantic god who holds corn and grapes in his hands is bearded, and the worshipper who approaches him also has a beard, and his hair is arranged in the distinctive fashion of the Semitic Babylonians and Assyrians. This type may represent Semitic mixture, for M. Chantre discovered at Kara-eyak, in Cappadocia, tablets in Semitic Babylonian representing traders' letters perhaps as old as 2000 bc. The type of the Ibreez figures has been said to resemble that of the Armenian peasantry of today; but, although the Armenians are Aryans of the old Phrygian stock, and their language almost purely Aryan, they have mixed with the Turkish and Semitic races, and have been said even to resemble the Jews. Little reliance can be placed, therefore, on comparison with modern mixed types. The Hittite pigtail is very distinctive of a Mongolic race. It was imposed on the Chinese by the Manchus in the 17th century, but it is unknown among Aryan or Semitic peoples, though it seems to be represented on some Akkadian seals, and on a bas-relief picturing the Mongolic Susians in the 7th century bc.
4. Hittite Dress
The costume of the Hittites on monuments seems also to indicate Mongolic origin. Kings and priests wear long robes, but warriors (and the gods at Ibreez and Babylon) wear short jerkins, and the Turkish shoe or slipper with a curled-up toe, which, however, is also worn by the Hebrew tribute bearers from Jehu on the "black obelisk" (about 840 bc) of Shalmaneser II. Hittite gods and warriors are shown as wearing a high, conical head-dress, just like that which (with addition of the Moslem turban) characterized the Turks at least as late as the 18th century. The short jerkin also appears on Akkadian seals and bas-reliefs, and, generally speaking, the Hittites (who were enemies of the Lycians, Danai and other Aryans to their west) may be held to be very clearly Mongolic in physical type and costume, while the art of their monuments is closely similar to that of the most archaic Akkadian and Babylonian sculptures of Mesopotamia. It is natural to suppose that they were a branch of the same remarkable race which civilized Chaldea, but which seems to have had its earliest home in Akkad, or the "highlands" near Ararat and Media, long before the appearance of Aryan tribes either in this region or in Ionia. The conclusion also agrees with the Old Testament statement that the Hittites were akin to the descendants of Ham in Babylonia, and not to the "fair" tribes (Japheth), including Medes, Ionians and other Aryan peoples.
5. Hittite Names
As early as 1866 Chabas remarked that the Hittite names (of which so many have been mentioned above) were clearly not Semitic, and this has been generally allowed. Those of the Amorites, on the other hand, are Semitic, and the type represented, with brown skin, dark eyes and hair, aqui-line features and beards, agrees (as is generally allowed) in indicating a Semitic race. There are now some 60 of these Hittite names known, and they do not suggest any Aryan etymology. They are quite unlike those of the Aryan Medes (such as Baga-datta, etc.) mentioned by the Assyrians, or those of the Vannic kings whose language (as shown by recently published bilinguals in Vannic and Assyrian) seems very clearly to have been Iranian - or similar to Persian and Sanskrit - but which only occurs in the later Assyrian age. Comparisons with Armenian and Georgian (derived from the Phrygian and Scythian) also fail to show any similarity of vocabulary or of syntax, while on the other hand comparisons with the Akkadian, the Kassite and modern Turkish at once suggest a linguistic connection which fully agrees with what has been said above of the racial type. The common element Tarku, or Tarkhan, in Hittite names suggests the Mongol dargo and the Turkish tarkhan, meaning a "tribal chief."
6. Vocabulary of Pterium Epistles
It has also been remarked that the vocabulary of the Hittite letters discovered by Chantre at Pterium recalls that of the letter written by Dusratta of Matiene to Amenophis 3 (Am Tab number 27, Berlin), and that Dusratta adored the Hittite god Tessupas. A careful study of the language of this letter shows that, in syntax and vocabulary alike, it must be regarded as Mongolic and as a dialect of the Akkadian group. The cases of the noun, for instance, are the same as in Akkadian and in modern Turkish. No less than 50 words and terminations are common to the language of this letter and of those discovered by M. Chantre and attributed to the Hittites whose territory immediately adjoined that of Matiene. The majority of these words occur also in Akkadian.
7. Tell El-Amarna Tablet
But in addition to these indications we have a letter in the Tell el-Amarna Letters (Berlin number 10) written by a Hittite prince, in his own tongue and in the cuneiform script. It is from (and not to, as has been wrongly supposed by Knudtzon) a chief named Tarchun-dara, and is addressed to Amenophis III, whose name stands first. In all the other letters the name of the sender always follows that of the recipient. The general meaning of this letter is clear from the known meanings of the "ideograms" used for many words; and it is also clear that the language is "agglutinative" like the Akkadian. The suffixed possessive pronouns follow the plural termination of the noun as in Akkadian, and prepositions are not used as they are in Semitic and Aryan speech; the precative form of the verb has also been recognized to be the same as used in Akkadian. The pronouns mi, "my," and ti, "thy," are to be found in many living Mongolic dialects (e.g. the Zyrianian me and te); in Akkadian also they occur as 1001 and zi. The letter opens with the usual salutation: "Letter to Amenophis 3 the great king, king of the land of Egypt (Mizzari-na), from Tarchun-dara (Tarchundara-da), king of the land of Arzapi (or Arzaa), thus. To me is prosperity. To my nobles, my hosts, my cavalry, to all that is mine in all my lands, may there be prosperity; (moreover?) may there be prosperity: to thy house, thy wives, thy sons, thy nobles, thy hosts, thy cavalry, to all that is thine in thy lands may there be prosperity." The letter continues to speak of a daughter of the Pharaoh, and of a sum of gold which is being sent in charge of an envoy named Irsappa. It concludes (as in many other instances) with a list of presents, these being sent by "the Hittite prince (Nu Chattu) from the land Igait" (perhaps the same as Ikata), and including, besides the gold, various robes, and ten chairs of ebony inlaid with ivory. As far as it can at present be understood, the language of this letter, which bears no indications of either Semitic or Aryan speech, whether in vocabulary or in syntax, strongly favors the conclusion that the native Hittite language was a dialect of that spoken by the Akkadians, the Kassites and the Minyans of Matiene, in the same age.
IV. Religion
1. Polytheism: Names of Deities
The Hittites like their neighbors adored many gods. Besides Set (or Sutekh), the "great ruler of heaven," and Ishtar (Ashtoreth), we also find mentioned (in Chattusil's treaty) gods and goddesses of "the hills and rivers of the land of the
2. Religious Symbolism
Their pantheon was thus also Mongolic, and the suggestion (by Dr. Winckler) that they adored Indian gods (Indra, Varuna), and the Persian Mithra, not only seems improbable, but is also hardly supported by the quotations from Semitic texts on which this idea is based. The sphinx is found as a Hittite emblem at Eyuk, North of Pterium, with the double-headed eagle which again, at Iasili-kaia, supports a pair of deities. It also occurs at Tel-loh as an Akkadian emblem, and was adopted by the Seljuk Turks about 1000 ad. At Eyuk we have a representation of a procession bringing goats and rams to an altar. At Iflatun-bunar the winged sun is an emblem as in Babylonia. At Mer'-ash, in Syria, the mother goddess carries her child, while an eagle perches on a harp beside her. At Carchemish the naked Ishtar is represented with wings. The religious symbolism, like the names of deities, thus suggests a close connection with the emblems and beliefs of the Kassites and Akkadians.
5 Script
1. Cuneiform and Hieroglyphic
In the 16th century bc, and down to the 13th century, the Hittites used the cuneiform characters and the Babylonian language for correspondence abroad. On seals and and mace-heads they used their own hieroglyphics, together with the cuneiform. These emblems, which occur on archaic monuments at Hamath, Carchemish and Aleppo in Syria, as well as very frequently in Cappadocia and Pontus, and less frequently as far West as Ionia, and on the East at Babylon, are now proved to be of Hittite origin, since the discovery of the seal of Arnuanta already noticed. The suggestion that they were Hittite was first made by the late Dr. W. Wright (British and Foreign Evangelical Review, 1874). About 100 such monuments are now known, including seals from Nineveh and Cappadocia, and Hittite gold ornaments in the Ashmolean Museum; and there can be little doubt that, in cases where the texts accompany figures of the gods, they are of a votive character.
2. Description of Signs
The script is quite distinctive, though many of the emblems are similar to those used by the Akkadians. There are some 170 signs in all, arranged one below another in the line - as among Akkadians. The lines read alternately from right to left and from left to right, the profile emblems always facing the beginning of each line.
The interpretation of these texts is still a controversial question, but the most valuable suggestion toward their understanding is that made by the late Canon Isaac Taylor (see ALPHABET ,
3. Interpretation of Monuments
These sounds are confirmed by the short bilinguals as yet known, and they appear in some cases at least to be very clearly the monosyllabic words which apply in Akkadian to similar emblems. We have thus the bases of a comparative study, by aid of a known language and script - a method similar to that which enabled Sir H. Rawlinson to recover scientifically the lost cuneiform, or Champollion to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphics. See also ARCHAEOLOGY OF ASIA MINOR;
Literature
The Egyptian notices will be found in Brugsch's
These files are public domain and were generously provided by the folks at WordSearch Software.
Orr, James, M.A., D.D. General Editor. Entry for 'Hittites'. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/isb/h/hittites.html. 1915.
