Bilingual from Karatepe

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Phoenician text on the back of the statue of the weather god at the south gate of Karatepe

The bilingual of Karatepe is a bilingual inscription that Helmuth Theodor Bossert discovered in 1946 on the Karatepe-Arslantaş . It consists of a Phoenician and a hieroglyphic Luwian part.

discovery

The Azatiwataya residence of Azatiwada , the ruler of a late Luwian city-state , was discovered and excavated by Bossert, Halet Çambel and Bahadır Alkım in 1946. Two monumental gates with reliefs, which are equipped with numerous inscriptions, were found. As early as 1947, Franz Steinherr, a pupil of Bossert, succeeded in inferring the name of the ruler ('ZTWD / then Asitawandas, today read as Azatiwada' in the then unreadable hieroglyphic Luwian part of the text (then still referred to as hieroglyphic Hittite ) ) and to recognize the inscriptions as bilingual . The Phoenician part of the texts was already legible at that time. The inscriptions were published first by Bossert, Çambel and Alkım and finally in 2000 by Halet Çambel, Bossert's assistant at the time and later successor at Karatepe, and John David Hawkins . The bilingual played a decisive role in the development of the Luwian hieroglyphs and the corresponding language.

description

Orthostats with Phoenician text on the north gate
Orthostats with hieroglyphic Luwian text on the south gate

The gates at Karatepe each consist of a forecourt and two side chambers, over which the reliefs and inscriptions are distributed. The text is available in three Phoenician and two hieroglyphic Luwian versions. Two of the Phoenician versions, designated by Bossert as Phu and Pho ("u" for the lower north gate, "o" for the upper south gate), can be found on the left side of the forecourt. At the north gate, the text begins on four connected orthostats and continues over several relief pedestals to end on a portal lion. At the south gate, most of the text is on the portal lion and is continued on an adjoining orthostat. The third version covers the front and back of the statue of a weather god at the south gate as well as the base of the statue consisting of two bull figures.

The two hieroglyphic versions Ho and Hu , which take up considerably more space due to the typeface, are distributed over plinths, reliefs, orthostats and portal lions in both the atria and the side chambers. In contrast to the orderly Phoenician version, the arrangement of this inscription is apparently completely arbitrary and contrary to the context of the text. The reason for this distribution is incomprehensible. Bossert rules out a lack of space, since simply swapping individual fragments would have led to a continuous arrangement without any problems, and a connection with the respective reliefs cannot be seen. Assumptions about a possible later change of the given list cannot be proven.

Content and dating

Azatiwada was one of Awariku (Urikki), king of Qu'e and Adana in Cilicia and vassal of Tiglath-Pileser III. , appointed ruler. The text is an autobiographical account of his services to the kingdom of Adana, where, according to the inscription, he enthroned the descendants of Awariku. From this it is concluded that the rule of the Azatiwada in the reign of the Awariku 738-732 BC. And until the beginning of the 7th century BC. Lasted. The origin of the inscription is assumed for the time after Avarikus death (after 709 BC). Stylistic analyzes of both the Phoenician text and the hieroglyphs also support this dating.

abstract

“I am Azatiwada, vizier of Baal, servant of Baal, whom Awariku, king of the Adanaans, made great. Baal made me a father and mother to the Adanaans. I revived the Adanaans. I spread the land of the plain of Adana from the rising of the sun to its setting. And in my day the Adanaans had goodness and supplies and prosperity. And I filled the memory of Paʿr. And I added horse to horse, and shield to shield, and army to army, according to Baal and the gods. And I destroyed the robbers caves and drove out every villain that was in the country .... "

- Azatiwada : translation of the Phoenician text after Edward Lipiński

The statue of Çineköy , which also contains a Phoenician-Luwian bilingualism, was made by King Awariku .

literature

  • Helmuth Theodor Bossert, Halet Çambel, Bahadır Alkım: Karatepe kazıları. (Birinci ön-rapor). = The excavations on Karatepe. (First preliminary report) (= Türk Tarih Kurumu yayınlarından V. seri, 9, ZDB -ID 1179835-x ). Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, Ankara 1950.
  • François Bron: Recherches sur les inscriptions phéniciennes de Karatepe (= Center de recherches d'histoire et de philologie de la 4e section de l'École pratique des hautes études 2, Hautes études orientales 11). Droz et al., Genève 1979.
  • K. Lawson Younger, Jr .: The Phoenician Inscription of Azatiwada. An Integrated Reading. In: Journal of Semitic Studies 43 (1998), pp. 11-47.
  • Halet Çambel: Karatepe-Aslantaş. The inscriptions (= Corpus of Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions Vol. 2 = Studies on Indo-European Linguistics and Cultural Studies NF 8, 2). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York NY 1998, ISBN 3-11-014870-6 .
  • John David Hawkins: Inscriptions of the Iron Age (= Corpus of the Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions Vol. 1 = Studies on Indo-European Linguistics and Cultural Studies NF 8, 1). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York NY 2000, ISBN 3-11-010864-X .
  • Wolfgang Röllig : Sense and Form - Formal structure and literary structure of the Karatepe inscription In: Güven Arsebük, Machteld J. Mellink , Wulf Schirmer (ed.): Light on Top of the Black Hill. Studies presented to Halet Çambel = Karatepe'deki Isik. Halet Çambel'e sunulan yazilar. Ege Yayınları, Istanbul 1998, ISBN 975-8070-20-7 , pp. 675-680

Individual evidence

Commons : Azatiwada inscription  - collection of images, videos and audio files
  1. ↑ Halet Çambel, Aslı Özyar: Karatepe-Arslantaş. Azatiwataya. The sculptures. Zabern, Mainz 2003, ISBN 3-8053-3085-5 , p. 4.
  2. ^ John David Hawkins: Inscriptions of the Iron Age (= Corpus of the Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions Vol. 1 = Studies on Indo-European Linguistics and Cultural Studies NF 8, 1). Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York NY 2000, ISBN 3-11-010864-X , pp. 44-45.
  3. ↑ Residence of the kings of Qu'e and Adana.
  4. ↑ Walter Beyerlin (Ed.): Religionsgeschichtliches Textbuch zum Alten Testament (= The Old Testament in German. Supplementary series vol. 1). 2nd, revised edition. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1985, ISBN 3-525-51659-2 , p. 258, at GoogleBooks from p. 258 .
  5. ↑ Complete translation in Google Book Search