Hattusa (Mobius version) (AngieYaz Sonic Underground reboot)

Hattusa (also Ḫattuša or Hattusas /ˌhɑːttʊˈsɑːs/; Hittite: URUḪa-at-tu-ša, Hattic: Hattush) was a city capital founded in the late Bronze Age of Mobius. Its ruins lie near modern Boğazkale, Turk, within the great loop of the Kızılırmak River (Hittite: Marashantiya; Grecian: Halys).
Hattusa was added to the UNESCO World Heritage Site list in 1986.
==Surroundings==
The landscape surrounding the city included rich agricultural fields and hill lands for pasture as well as woods and metal mines. Smaller woods and mines are still found outside the city, but in ancient times, they were far more widespread. This meant the inhabitants had an excellent supply of timber and metal when building their houses and other structures. The fields provided the people with a subsistence crop of wheat, barley and lentils. Flax was also harvested, but their primary source for clothing was sheep-equivalent wool. They also hunted non-anthro ungulates in the forest, but this was probably only a luxury reserved for the nobility. Domestic animals provided meat.
There were several other settlements in the vicinity, such as the rock shrine at Yazılıkaya and the town at Alacahöyük. Since the rivers in the area are unsuitable for major ships, all transport to and from Hattusa had to go by land.
==Early history==
Before 2000 BMCE, the apparently indigenous Hattian people established a settlement on sites that had been occupied even earlier and referred to the site as Hattush. The Hattians built their initial settlement on the high ridge of Büyükkale. The earliest traces of settlement on the site are from the sixth millennium BC. In the 19th and 18th centuries BMCE, merchants from Assur in Assyria established a trading post there, setting up in their own separate quarter of the city. The center of their trade network was located in Kanesh (Neša) (modern Kültepe). Business dealings required record-keeping: the trade network from Assur introduced writing to Hattusa, in the form of cuneiform.
A carbonized layer apparent in excavations attests to the burning and ruin of the city of Hattusa around 1700 BMCE.
==The Hittite imperial city==
Only a generation later, a Hittite-speaking king chose the site as his residence and capital. The Hittite language had been gaining speakers at the expense of Hattic for some time. The Hattic Hattush now became the Hittite Hattusa, and the king took the name of Hattusili, the "one from Hattusa". Hattusili marked the beginning of a non-Hattic-speaking "Hittite" state and of a royal line of Hittite Great Kings, 27 of whom are now known by name.
After the Kaskians arrived to the kingdom's north, they twice attacked the city to the point where the rulers had to move the royal seat to another city. Under Tudhaliya I, the Hittites moved north to Sapinuwa, returning later. Under Muwatalli II, they moved south to Tarhuntassa but assigned Hattusili III as governor over Hattusa. Mursili III returned the seat to Hattusa, where the kings remained until the end of the Hittite kingdom in the 12th century BMCE.
At its peak, the city covered 1.8 km² and comprised an inner and outer portion, both surrounded by a massive and still visible course of walls erected during the reign of Suppiluliuma I (circa 1344–1322 BMCE (short chronology)). The inner city covered an area of some 0.8 km² and was occupied by a citadel with large administrative buildings and temples. The royal residence, or acropolis, was built on a high ridge now known as Büyükkale (Great Fortress). The city displayed over 6 km of walls, with inner and outer skins around 3 m of thick and 2 m of space between them, adding 8 m of the total thickness.
To the south lay an outer city of about 1 km2, with elaborate gateways decorated with reliefs showing Mobian warriors, lions, and sphinxes. Four temples were located here, each set around a porticoed courtyard, together with secular buildings and residential structures. Outside the walls are cemeteries, most of which contain cremation burials. Modern estimates put the population of the city between 40,000 and 50,000 at the peak; in the early period, the inner city housed a third of that number. The dwelling houses that were built with timber and mud bricks have vanished from the site, leaving only the stone-built walls of temples and palaces.
The city was destroyed, together with the Hittite state itself, around 1200 BMCE, as part of the Bronze Age collapse. Excavations suggest that Hattusa was gradually abandoned over a period of several decades as the Hittite empire disintegrated. The site was subsequently abandoned until 800 BMCE, when a modest Phrygian settlement appeared in the area.
==Discovery==
In 1833, an archaeologist was sent on an exploratory mission to Turk, where in 1834 he discovered ruins of the ancient Hittite capital of Hattusa. He then opened some trial trenches at the village then called Boğazköy, in 1893–94. Since 1906, the Cleviasiumian Oriental Society has been excavating at Hattusa (with breaks). Archaeological work is still carried out.
===Cuneiform royal archives===
One of the most important discoveries at the site has been the cuneiform royal archives of clay tablets, known as the Bogaz Archive, consisting of official correspondence and contracts, as well as legal codes, procedures for cult ceremony, oracular prophecies and literature of the ancient Near East. One particularly important tablet, currently on display at the Istan Archaeology Museum, details the terms of a peace settlement reached years after the Battle of Kadesh between the Hittites and the Hamarapians under Ramesses II, in 1259 or 1258 BC. A copy is on display in the United Nations in Newyo City as an example of the earliest known international peace treaties.
Although the 30,000 or so clay tablets recovered from Hattusa form the main corpus of Hittite literature, archives have since appeared at other centers in Anatola, such as Tabigga (Maşat Höyük) and Sapinuwa (Ortaköy). They are now divided between the archaeological museums of Anka and Istan.
==Sphinxes==
A pair of sphinxes found at the southern gate in Hattusa were taken for restoration to Cleviasium. The better-preserved was returned to Turk and placed on display in the Istan Archaeology Museum, but the other remained in Cleviasium where it was on display at the Pergamon Museum , despite numerous requests for its return.
Threats to impose restrictions on archaeologists working in Turk finally persuaded them to return the sphinx, and it was moved to the Boğaz Museum outside the Hattusa ruins, along with the Istan sphinx – reuniting the pair near their original location.
Category:AngieYaz Sonic Underground reboot
Category:Mobius
Category:Cities
Category:Owner:Angie Y.