Fortress Hittite Fortifications c1650-700BC Osprey Books

In the second half of the 3rd millennium BC the Indo-European tribe known as the Hittites started to migrate to and settle in Central Anatolia, which at that time was a land of small city-states whose rulers lived in fortresses. The merging of the Hittites with the local Hattian population was a fairly peaceful process, although armed conflicts are known to have occurred. Initially, the Hittites were divided into separate tribes, but they eventually became welded into a single kingdom, based on the formidable fortress of Hattusha (modern Boghazky).From the 16th century BC onwards the Hittites began to exert pressure on the Egyptian Empire and during the reign of Shuppiluliuma I (c.1370-35 BC) the Hittite State reached its prime. He and his successors, Murshili II and Muwatalli, made the New Hittite Empire one of the leading powers of Ancient Near East, comparable with Egypt and Babylon. As a result of military operations or carefully thought-out treaties, the Hittites annexed the western regions of Asia Minor, the kingdom of Mitanni and North Syria as far as Euphrates. They finally clashed with the Egyptians at the battle of Kadesh (c.1274 BC), after which the two super-powers of the Bronze Age signed a peace treaty.The period of imperial glory did not last long. Towards the end of the 13th century BC years of poor harvests and invasions by the Sea Peoples started the decline of the Hittite Empire. Additional fortifications were erected in Hattusha and the grain supplies were barricaded within a separate citadel on Buyukkaya. However, this did not save the capital and c.1200 BC the last Hittite king, Shuppiluliuma II left Hattusha for an unknown destination. In the 12th-8th centuries BC several small late-Hittite kingdoms lingered on the territory of the once flourishing Hittite Empire, most of which were eventually swallowed up by Assyria.This title will detail the fortifications constructed by the Hittites, focussing on their principal city, Hattusha, but also detailing their other fortresses throughout Anatolia.