Rock inscription from Kötükale

Coordinates: 38 ° 28 ′ 30 ″  N , 37 ° 41 ′ 31 ″  E

Kötükale​

Turkey

The rock inscription from Kötükale in central Turkey is an inscription in Luwian hieroglyphics and probably dates from the late 12th century BC. After road works in 1935 the inscription is buried.

location

The location of the rock inscription is about nine kilometers east of the village of Balaban near the village of Hisarcık (formerly Kötükale) in the Darende district of the Turkish province of Malatya . At this point, the Tohma Çayı coming from the west flows through a gorge, on the southern side of which the modern road runs. The place of the inscription is assumed between the road and the rock. The river was important for the late Hittite kingdom of Melid as was the Kuru Çayı, which flows further east to the Euphrates , on the one hand as a water dispenser for the fertile plain of Malatya, on the other hand as a traffic route north to the former heartland of the Hittite empire. For this reason, there are several inscriptions on its course, including the rock inscriptions by Gürün and Şırzı .

Find and lose

The 1907 Cornell expedition to Asia Minor and the Assyro-Babylonian Orient ( Cornell University ) was informed of the inscription by an Armenian gunsmith from Darende, who also gave them a self-made copy of the last two lines. Despite two attempts, however, they were unable to see the writing themselves because the water level in the river was too high. The German archaeologist Hans Henning von der Osten failed in 1929 because of the same problem. When the American ancient orientalist Ignace Gelb visited the place in 1935, at the last moment he was able to prevent the rock from being blown up during road construction work. He took photographs of the inscription, which are the only ones to this day. During their visit in August 1954, Helmuth Theodor Bossert and his colleague Mustafa Kalaç first discovered that the inscription stone was now buried underground. After calculations based on Gelbs pictures and measurements, they were able to uncover the top two lines when digging 1.75 meters below the surface. The Hittite scientist John David Hawkins , who visited the site in 1974 and 1986, and the German architect Horst Ehringhaus , who researched the late Hittite rock reliefs and inscriptions after 2000, could only photograph the surroundings, but both found that an excavation would be possible and promising .

description

The writing field is about 1.80 meters high and 1.20 meters wide. It consists of six lines separated by lines. Signs and dividing lines are executed in relief. The text begins at the top right and can be read boustrophedon . The author is Runtija von Melid , the same king who wrote the Gürün inscriptions. Similar to there, the inscription can be divided into four sections: dedication to gods, presentation with descent, narrative part and curse formula. After the dedication to the great Tarhunza and five other unidentifiable gods, Runtija introduces himself here as the grandson of Kuzzitissuba, son of PUGNUS-milis (I.), the sovereign of Malida . The grandfather Kuzzitissuba is among other things from seal impressions from the end times of the Hittite Empire around 1200–1185 BC. Known as king of the Hittite state of Karkemiš . After the end of the empire, Karkemiš became independent and Kuzzitissuba was the first ruler to call himself the great king in the Hittite tradition. From there, the kingdom of Malida (Melid) was founded as a secondary education under Kuzzitissuba's son PUGNUS-milis, Runtija's father.

In the following the author reports on road construction works:

"I put this [...] tunnel higher and made this stone path."

Then a mountain is mentioned, the rest of the text is not understandable. In the concluding formula of the curse, whoever removes the name Runtijas ... is threatened with the punishment of Tarhunza and the other gods.

Due to the known reigns of the named rulers, the inscription is dated to the late 12th century BC. Dated.

Web links

• hittitemonuments.com

literature

• Eberhard P. Rossner: Rock monuments in Turkey. Volume 1: The Hittite rock reliefs in Turkey. An archaeological guide. 2nd, expanded edition. Rossner, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-924390-02-9 , pp. 236-238.
• John David Hawkins: Corpus of hieroglyphic Luwian inscriptions . Vol 1. Inscriptions of the Iron Age . Part 1: Introduction, Karatepe, Karkamiš, Tell Ahmar, Maraş, Malatya, Commagene. de Gruyter, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-11-010864-X , pp. 299–301, plates 139–141.
• Horst Ehringhaus: The end that was a beginning. Rock reliefs and rock inscriptions of the Luwian states of Asia Minor from 12. to 8./7. Century BC Chr. Nünnerich-Asmus, Mainz 2014, ISBN 978-3-943904-67-3 , pp. 87-91.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Benson Brush Charles, Hittite Inscriptions (Cornell Expedition to Asia Minor) Ithaca, New York, 1911 pp. 38-39 digitized
2. ^ John David Hawkins: Corpus of hieroglyphic Luwian inscriptions . Vol 1. Inscriptions of the Iron Age . Part 1: Introduction, Karatepe, Karkamiš, Tell Ahmar, Maraş, Malatya, Commagene. de Gruyter, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-11-010864-X, plates 139–141.
3. ↑ ^{a b} German translations quoted from Horst Ehringhaus: The end that was a beginning. Rock reliefs and rock inscriptions of the Luwian states of Asia Minor from 12. to 8./7. Century BC Chr. Nünnerich-Asmus, Mainz 2014, ISBN 978-3-943904-67-3 , pp. 87-91