(Feb 11, 2023, updated February 1, 2025) These texts at Karatepe in southern Turkey are found along the ancient Ceyhan River trade route. They try to explain why a drought is happening. Given the use of 2 Serabit el-Khadim style letters (T and P), the lack of sentence dividers, and the extensive effort to compose these stone this may be describing the Great Drought of 1180 BCE which ended the Iron Age. The other alternative is the drought of 980 BCE. The language is Akkadian. These stone slabs along with slabs showing images were placed at the north gate of some sort of official complex along a trade route. The narrow middle right text is on a stone slab placed endwise.
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(January 26, 2025) The image shows a procession with one man leading another on a lion having a bird head with a rising sun above the head. The sun lion represents the orderly life network. The birds of the life network are the eagle-vultures which edit the network connections.
Image from: http://www.hittitemonuments.com/karatepe/ by Tayfun Bilgin who has a comprehensive collection of photos from this site.
Karatepe is located on a hill overlooking a major trade route between the Mediterranean and Anatolia/Mesopotamia.
(Feb 11, 2023) Karatepe means “Black Hill” in Turkish. It is an ancient fortified hill in the province of Cilicia. Together with the neighboring fortress Domuztepe it dominates the trade route from northern Syria into Central Anatolia across the Anti-Taurus mountain range. It is located about 45 miles northeast of Adana. It was excavated during 1947 to 1957 by Halet Cambel and H. Th. Bossert. The texts are now displayed at the Karatepe Archaeological Park. Another excavation occurred between 1997 and 1999 by U. Bahadir Alkim.
The city and fortresses were founded around 1,100 BCE after the Great Drought which ended the Bronze Age. The city has continued to exist into the present. No archaeological dates have ever been published for the tablets.
Ceram, C.W. (1956) The Secret of the Hittites, The Discovery of an Ancient Empire. Pheonix Press, London
Mazar and Panitz-Cohen (2019) Tel Batash in the Late Bronze Age. Online at: https://www.academia.edu/40130336/Mazar_and_Panitz_Cohen_2019_Tel_Batash_in_the_Late_Bronze_Age20190820_6759_bfg08d
Stefania Mazzoni (Oct 2018) Book review of the final excavation report in Journal of Near Eastern Studies Vol. 77 Issue 2, p305-307. Book written in German and is titled: Karatepe-Arslantas. Azatiwataya by Martina Sicker-Akman, Eva Maria Bossert, and Wolfgang Fischer-Bossert. Deutsches Archaologisches Institut, Archaologische Forschungen 29. Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag
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Image from: http://www.hittitemonuments.com/karatepe/ by Tayfun Bilgin who has a comprehensive collection of photos from this site.
Phoenician letter style with Israelite yod (I,Y) and Etruscan lamed (L)
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