Wine and Viticulture in Hittite Anatolia
Final Report Abstract
As an introductory remark, it must be considered that the bulk of the Hittite textual documentation concerning wine and viticulture has not changed substantially from the evidence shown in Gorny’s work, published more than 20 years ago. For this reason the results of this project were possible only because of extensive philological-oriented contextual analysis and the effort to reconstruct, as much as possible, the content of the original tablets by joining new fragments also with the help of useful duplicates. This effort resulted in about 40 new joins spread out among almost all the diverse textual typologies examined with the outcome to have re-established several “new” manuscripts, or extensive parts of them. As is well known, the knowledge of land management system is a crucial point for understanding the ancient Near Eastern economy. This research established the average percentage of land devoted to viticulture as well as to agriculture in Hittite Anatolia and in the kingdom of Mukish. Furthermore, thanks to new textual data, it is possible to calculate the approximate quantity of seeds used for the sowing of one IKU-measure of field. The scenario opens new perspectives, not only for the position of the vineyards within the land management system and, more broadly, the agrarian economy, but also for the study of settlement data and landscape analysis for Hittite Anatolia and its ancient Near Eastern context in the Late Bronze Age. The possible quantity of wine produced in one hectar of vineyards was calculated. Compared with what had been stated up until now, a lower percentage of terrain devoted to vines corresponds with a higher percentage of wine production. This data could be compared, for further research, with that which was recently published by Yasur-Landau et al. 2018 about the excavation of wine storage workshop at the Middle Bronze II Palace of Tel Kabri (northern Israel). Concerning the grapevine, substantial progress has been made in the fields of terminology, on the botany of the plant as well as on its reproduction (the cutting from the ‘mother vine’) and cultivation (transplanting of young vines; vines trained onto the hornbeam or the elm) techniques. The same can be said about the “vine dressers” and their work in the vineyard; they must have been highly specialized in managing and caring of the grapevines. Now we know that the wood from the pruning of the vineyards was sold and that it was used as fuel for heating and/or lighting. The research carried out on the wine has shown that during the earliest periods of the Hittite kingdom the word (DUG)išpantuzzi- “libation(-vessel), offering, ration” was connected exclusively with wine. During the same period the “chief of wine” had a key role in the drinking ritual and not - or not exclusively - in political and military duties; we owe this information to the reconstruction of a long excerpt of the third tablet of the “festival of the market” where the chief of wine is the official in charge of the elaborate preparation of the wine that the king used in the liturgy of drinking ritual in honour of the gods. In conclusion I would like to focus on two manuscripts which play a fundamental role in understanding the importance of wine and the vine for the Hittites. The first deals with a celebration - up until now little-known - in honor of Mountain Hazzi. Thanks to this manuscript it is now possible to show that the Hittite king Tuthaliya II/III began conquering North-western Syrian territories including Kizzuwatna, Mukiš and, possibly, Aleppo, well before what had been previously assumed. The cultural and religious traditions of these territories in north-western Syria deeply influenced this king to the point that he reproduced in Central Anatolia the landscape of that area, with gardens and large vineyards. What I would like to argue is that at the beginning of 14th century BC there was a resurgence of viticulture in Central Anatolia as well as the almost exclusive use of wine in the celebrations. This tradition seems to come from southern Anatolia and north-western Syria, a region traditionally dedicated, due to its favorable climatic conditions, to wine-growing practices. The second text, called “Blessing for the Labarna”, deserves special attention because it is an invocation ritual that was performed to assure the prosperity of the royal vineyard and to grant prosperity to the sovereign’s household. After a careful reconstruction it was determined to be, in fact, a “ritual of installation of a new vineyard” and, in a broader sense, a “work on viticulture”; the first known to my knowledge. A comparison with the “Sumerian Georgica” is not possible because the latter is a true manual of agronomy, designed to accurately track all phases from plowing to sowing, up to harvest. The Hittite text, on the other hand, is less detailed and constantly subjected to divine intervention, but it too, dictates the salient phases of a vineyard's installation and introduces the fundamental elements for its growth and prosperity.
Publications
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Texte aus dem Bezirk des Großen Tempels, XVI, Keilschrifttexte aus Boghazköi 66; Gebr. Mann Verlag. Berlin 2015
Corti, C.
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2017. From Mt. Hazzi to Šapinuwa. Cultural Traditions in Motion in the First Half of the 14th Century BC, Mesopotamia 52, 3-20
Corti, C.
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2017. The North: Hanhana, Hattina, Ištahara, Hakpiš, Nerik, Zalpuwa, Tummana, Pala and the Hulana River Land, in M. Weeden and L.Z. Ullmann (eds.), Hittite Landscape and Geography, HdO 121, Leiden – Boston, 219-238
Corti, C.
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2017. Wine and Vineyards in the Hittite Kingdom: a Case Study of Northern Anatolia and the Southern Black Sea Coast, in L. Thys Şenocak (ed.), Of Vines and Wines: the Production and Consumption of Wine in Anatolian Civilizations through the Ages. Proceedings of the International Symposium Held at Koç University, RCAC, ANESS 51, Istanbul, 41-60
Corti, C.
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2017. Zalpa/u(wa), RlA 15 3./4., Berlin – New York, 198–200
Corti C.
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Along the Road to Nerik. Local Panthea of Hittite Northern Anatolia, Die Welt des Orients 48/1, 24-71
Corti, Carlo
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The knowledge of Viticulture in Hittite Anatolia: An Interdisciplinary Approach, in C. Corti (ed.), Viticulture and Wine in Hittite Anatolia and its Ancient Near Eastern Context: Philological, Archaeological and Comparative Perspectives Die Welt des Orients 48/2
Corti, Carlo
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Viticulture and Wine in Hittite Anatolia and its Ancient Near Eastern Context: Philological, Archaeological and Comparative Perspectives, Die Welt des Orients 48/2
Corti, Carlo
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The Hittite King and the Vine, in A. Süel (ed.), Acts of the IX International Congress of Hittitology, Çorum. Ankara : T.C. Çorum Valiliği, 2019. ISBN
978-975-17-4338-1
Corti, C.
