Just got back from a dig in Turkey and I think we're totally misreading those Hittite tablets

I was part of a team cataloging clay tablets at a site near Ankara for three months, and the standard take is that they're all admin records or treaties. But imo, a bunch of them read more like personal letters or even early poetry, which most scholars shrug off. We kept finding phrases with repetitive, almost rhythmic patterns that don't fit typical inventory lists. My supervisor said it's just formulaic writing, but I spent nights comparing them to later lyric fragments and the vibe is similar. It feels like everyone's so focused on kings and wars that they're missing the human stuff. I even showed a few to a linguist friend who agreed it's weird. Has anyone else worked with Hittite stuff and felt this way? Or am I just overthinking it?

3 comments

3 Comments

sandraa821mo ago

Your post really hits home! I sorted old clay tablets from Iraq and found what looked like love notes in the tax lists. My team laughed, but the words felt too personal to be just accounts!

paigesullivan1mo ago

That tablet recording "three bushels of barley for the house of the woman with kind eyes" definitely had a secret admirer in the accounting office. Those ancient scribes were the original masters of hiding personal notes in boring paperwork. I bet the guy was hoping she'd be the one to audit his records later.

oscarb771mo ago

Always funny how people still do this... like hiding jokes in spreadsheet tabs now. Guess some things don't really change.