The Kingdom of the Hittites: The Least Known Empire of the Second Millennium B.C.E.

Abstract

While scholarly and popular books concerning the Bible are still being published in Hebrew in great numbers, Hebrew books on the cultures of the ancient Near East (ANE), cultures that form the essential background for understanding the world from which the Bible emerged, are few and far between. It is therefore no wonder that Professor Itamar Singer's The Hittites and Their Civilization is the first comprehensive volume in Hebrew dedicated to the Hittites, who are the less celebrated ancient inhabitants of the region, compared with the Egyptians, Babylonians, or Assyrians. The publication of a detailed study of the Hittites and their culture in Hebrew, written by the leading Israeli Hittitologist, is therefore a particularly happy occasion. The book, which is based on the most up-to-date scholarship, is written in a popular format. It is highly readable and of much interest as an introduction to this great and ancient civilization. The culture of the Hittites flourished in Anatolia during the second mil lennium B.C.E., first as a localized kingdom and eventually as a powerful re gional empire. At its zenith, the empire brought large parts of northern Mesopotamia and Syria under its domination and confronted the powerful Egyptian empire under Ramses II with equal force. The capital of the Hittites, Hattusa, was the mightiest metropolis of the ancient world, and even a century of extensive excavations has not exhausted its treasures. However, both the kingdom and capital, as well as the culture of the Hittites were lost and forgotten, and their rediscovery came relatively late compared with those of ancient Egypt, Sumer, Akkad, Babylon, Assyria, Persia, and Greece, all of which reemerged from the shadows of the past during the nineteenth century owing to the inspired work of archaeologists, historians, linguists, and the decipherers of forgotten scripts. The Hittite empire was re discovered only about a century ago, and to a certain extent remained mar ginal in spite of the exciting discoveries associated with it. For example, the