At a glance
Hattusa arranged permanence and ephemerality so deliberately that moving through the city was also a political act: carved stone gates and rock sanctuaries marked fixed points, while most houses were built to be repaired and replaced. That contrast — public stone and private mudbrick, backed by thousands of clay tablets — forces a single question: how did a state use durable thresholds and intensive record‑keeping together to organise power and ritual?
Sources
modern
- Paola Dardano, 'The Tablet Collections of the Hittite State', discussion of Building A and the citadel archives.Link
- Deutsches Archäologisches Institut e‑Forschungsberichte: report on Büyükkale palace area.Link
- Trevor R. Bryce, Life and Society in the Hittite World — overview of palace plan and city scale.Link
- Understanding Ancient Fortifications: chapter on Hittite construction (Kastenmauer, timber + mudbrick superstructure).Link
- H. Genz & D. P. Mielke (eds.), Insights into Hittite History and Archaeology (papers on Büyükkale buildings and functions).Link
- Ömür Harmanşah, Place, Memory, and Healing: discussion of Yazılıkaya and processional topography.Link
- Oriental Institute paper on KI.LAM logistics and palace role in processions.Link
- Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Culture and Tourism: summary of Hattusa and the palace citadel Büyükkale.Link