The Kingdom of the Hittites

by Trevor Bryce

In the 14th century B.C. the Hittites became the supreme political and military power in the Near East. How did they achieve their supremacy? How successful were they in maintaining it? What brought about their collapse and disappearance? This comprehensive history of the Hittite kingdom seeks to answer these questions. It takes account of important recent advances in Hittite scholarship, including some major archaeological discoveries made in the last few years. It also features numerous translations from the original texts, so that on many issues the ancient Hittites are given the opportunity to speak to the modern reader for themselves. The revised edition contains a substantial amount of new material, as well as numerous other revisions to the first edition.

Genres: History, Ancient History, Nonfiction, Ancient, Middle East, Archaeology, Historical

574 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 4, 1998

Reviews

[Hugolane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bryce is quite up front about this being a political history, and so I can't accuse him of false advertising. He tells the story of the political and military ups and downs of the Hittite Kingdom well, but if you are looking for a book that will give you a glimpse of the broader swath of Hittite society, their myths and such this is not that book. Much of that seems to have to do with the sources, which not surprisingly for an age of scribes almost exclusively in the pay of kings focus on the deeds of kings interspersed with court intrigues. While we know the names of major Gods I gather the Hittite elite did not feel it necessary to write those down. Similarly one can hardly imagine getting a glimpse of the life of ordinary farmers and trades people in this time via historical documents, but I wonder if Bryce might not have dedicated a chapter or two to what archeology of Hittite sites tells us about everyday like. Similarly, while some attention is paid to Hittite diplomacy, Bryce really assumes the reader has a fair grasp of the nature of the international system at this period. Having said that, the final chapter about the relationship of the Trojan War myth to actual history is quite insightful, much more so than what one generally encounters in more Helleno-centric explorations of the matter, and I can't wait to weave some of the points made there into a lecture on the Bronze Age and the Rise of the Greeks at some time in the future.

[Terence]

6 out of 10

The Kingdom of the Hittites is a fascinating look at the 500+ years when the Land of Hatti was a major player in the politics of the eastern Mediterranean and Middle East (roughly 1650 - 1150 BCE).

While there's probably not a huge audience among general readers for this book, it's not overly specialized and if you're simply interested in history qua history, as I am, it reveals the richness of the past.

Recommended.

[The Esoteric Jungle · Rating 1 out of 5]

Bryce is one of those Assers wise (sic) who delights in saying only what current opinion says we *can’t know,* then enjoys going on to re-interpret - ‘exactly’ in his mind - the motives of these various sacred Hathor/Hattusha, and not so very sacred at all Itti’s, motives. Should I mention the latter are listed in Westerners sacred writ as one of the most bloody, baal loving, micro-orchestrating “fallen cainanite” peoples in such said writ? No, too controversial.

All that these variant peoples lived and died for (or killed for sport for, as to the Ittis), all their motives, Bryce carefully re-explains using only his limited, recent, utilitarian, neo-economical, ‘real-politik’ schtick - oh, along with a few shards of pottery.

Truly he owes everything, as he expresses in his acknowledgement, to Professor Silvin Košak. And his scant sources he quotes from - rather than thousands of Hittite texts and historians from all centuries and surrounding nations speaking on exactly these conflicts at these times, in these areas - are merely, basically, nata except as follows: Edel, Wiseman, Hauptman (who snow jobbed forever our most extensive finds to date of the Chalcolithic period so unknown to man now, namely NorsunTeppe and Samisdat Mega Temples in Turkey they built ponds over and sunk though they are larger than the temples in Giza and revealed the most important peoples of the ancient days!!! You should look into who financed Hauptman, by the way, I can’t even say the name as moderns are so potty-trained to sleepishly preconscious preen when any say such names that they might quickly call them “conspiracy theorists” and then calmly blink off without any active mentation of their own), Hoffner, Maeir and a very few, select, translated Hittite texts.

So I will close here by saying just two things.

First, if I had a dollar for every time a scholar giddishly decryed “alas we still await publication,” or “alas these seem to have been misplaced or lost,” for example on the “over 3,000 tablets discovered at Sapinuwa,” he mentions in the preface (and endless finds like such we could add to this), I would be a very rich man; in converse degree to mankind now who is very poor in knowledge as modern a-historic ‘it’s’ principly because all such exact finds are, as a rule, almost never made public to them at all and never will be.

And second, rather than beginning all his history, he proceeds to lay out, at 1886 BC, where it should begin, and where old dating on the Hittites and on KhaMu(she)Rabbi once placed all such correctly (the latter’s accession being in 1826), he quickly dismisses over said old chronology and starts it all 236 years too late at 1650 BC just one century before the Deucalion conflagration!

And this, even though Newton warned, totally unheeded, in his excellent work on chronologies, how these 236 extra years were taken out of most histories and dissimulated with each other quite specifically, chronologically.

This changes and makes a-historic and impossible to alocate anything he further says at that point; dislocates all and any of his data from actual, broader, historic records of events going on in those said days.

I have nothing further to say, except, just find the translations of the tablets from these times directly that are not about barley and the tethering of horses (very hard to do) and then find the hundreds of chronologers from surrounding areas near such times as we already possess in great number who spoke on the migrations and conflicts and peoples and cultures in these areas, instead.

[Monique Roddy · Rating 5 out of 5]

reads like fiction in parts. does an excellent telling of the Hittites' history, but peeks in his section on the Neo Hittite Empire.

[CivilWar · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you have to read one and only one book on the Hittites, I would by far recommend this one: this is the book to read on the Hittites, the greatest single-volume history of the Hittites.

Excellently narrated without ever falling into the fancies of "narrative" history (in truth, it's due to the character of our sources, annals and such, which Bryce is appropriately critical of without dismissing them), putting together an enormous bibliography of Hittitological material and quoting from the primary sources as often as possible, this is a book that feels like an epic even though it is a footnote-filled dry academic history simply due to how interesting its subject topic is and how skillfully it has been presented, from countless disjointed and very often fragmentary texts, to the lay reader. Everything, from the pathetics of the diplomacy between Hattusili III and a Mycenaean king (one of the first few recorded instances of such a thing) to the personal struggles of Mursili II which made him a compelling character for the shoujo romance Red River to the mechanics behind how a woman got the coveted Tawananna title and the internal struggle it caused, to the Mycenaean-backed insurrectionist Pyamaradu, this is both a systematic history of Hittite Anatolium as a whole, as well as of individual people whenever possible, with Bryce never being taken over either by conservative denial of possibilities or going after exciting novelties with little basis to them.

Again, by far the best history of the Hittites around: I read this alongside (skimming) the author's Life and Society in the Hittite World, about Hittite cultural customs, and will most certainly read what may whimsically called a "sequel", The World of Neo-Hittite Kingdoms: A Political and Military History. The author has also written an introductory history, Warriors of Anatolia: A Concise History of the Hittites, which seems redundant since it is not much shorter than this work: yet, it is from 2020 and is no doubt worth reading for the many advancements in archaeology and Hittitology since.

Masterclass of bronze age historical writing.

[Halil Öğüt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hep merak ettiğim ve yakın hissettiğim bir medeniyet. Kitap biraz akademik olsa da çok öğretici ve bölümlerin hikaye tadı kitabı çok akıcı hale getiriyor.
Hititlerin medeniyeti ile ilgili konulardaki bilgilere ulaşmadaki ve kronoloji oluşturmadaki zorluklarla ilgili güzel bir bölüm var.
Kitapta Troya ve İlyada ile ilgili ufuk açıcı bir bölüm de var. İlyada’yı okurkenki hisleri değiştirecek cinsten bir bölüm.
Kizzuwadna’da doğduğumu ve prenses Puduhepa’nın da oralı olduğunu öğrenmek hoştu.

[Spencer Clevenger · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great overview of what we know of the Hittites.

[Naomi Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. I was so hooked into the stories. I love how many primary/translated texts he includes. I need more of the letters between Hitties & Egyptians. So much drama. So much sass. It took me much longer to read through because I kept getting distracted looking up Hittite resources to learn more or because I was dramatically re-enacting the events for Roommate.

There are some inconsistencies due to inherent sexism, as expected, but not as bad as other authors I've read (which doesn't way much - Hans Licht sets the bar Very Low). Bryce does do a much better job with the polytheism than many academics, which was refreshing. He also does well trying to be fair to all sides of the story.

The chapter on the fall of the Hittite kingdom felt a little disjointed from the rest of the text, which is very story oriented, but I suppose that's due to a dearth of primary sources. I appreciated the final chapter about the Trojan War, which is the main reason I picked up this book.

I quite enjoyed this book & will definitely be going back to it at some point in the future.

[B.W. Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This excellent book works its way through the Hittite KIngs, reign by reign, starting with Labarna around 1620 bc. and ending at the Bronze Age collapse around 1200 bc. It would not unreasonable to describe it as a collection of biogrpahies, although the continuity makes it more than that.

It is always wonderful to discover a book which is so immensely well informed and yet so easy to read. Bryce is very much an expert in his field, and it shows.

[Bruce Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was an immense pleasure to read "The Kingdom of the Hittites" by Trevor Bryce. The subject matter is specialised and in many cases obscure and yet he brings it to life whilst maintaing the highest academic standards. I strongly recommend it as a classic Ancient History.

[Quinton Carr · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good general history of the Hittites.

[Kimberly Rivera · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow! This is a comprehensive history of Bronze Age Anatolia and Syria. It looks not only at the Hittites but their contemporaries as well, such as the Mitannis, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, and the Egyptians. It even looks at the tribes that surrounded the land of Hatti, such as the Kaska, Lukka, Kizzuwadna, Arzawa, and Wilusa people. Even though I had read other books on the Egyptians, Assyrians, and Mesopotamian civilizations before, I learned information about them in this book that I hadn't learned previously.
Despite the resounding positives, there are negatives. One, the book is over a decade old. Since then, new information about the Hitttites have come to light. Second, the writing is dense and the pace is slow. I know this is a textbook, but I have read others that weren't this dry and dull.
Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone interested in Hittite and Syrian history. Just be prepared for a slow and a long haul.

[Benja · Rating 4 out of 5]

SINOPSIS:

Estudio sobre el reino de los Hititas, desde su origen hasta su repentina desaparición. Es un estudio centrado exclusivamente en la política y su expansión militar siguiendo a los reyes como línea de conducción para esta exposición.

COMENTARIO:

Ensayo magnífico sobre el mundo Hitita. Lo único que echo de menos es que se trata de un estudio histórico centrado en la política y en su expansión militar. No toca para nada sus costumbres sociales, religiosas, avances en tecnología (como por ejemplo, que fueron los primeros en trabajar con hierro), etc. Así que tendré que hacerme con un libro que hable de estos temas.
El imperio Hitita es un imperio casi desconocido. Existen muchísimas lagunas sobre él, que lucho contra los grandes imperios del momento, incluso contra el poderoso Ramses II, en la batalla de Kadest.

La genealogía de sus reyes nos sirve de línea conductora para repasar la vida y obra del imperio Hitita, o de Hati, como se le conocía también.

Nos muestra en el libro cómo nace el imperio, que se situaba en el centro de la península de Anatolia, en una gran curva del río Samarraniya (que era como lo conocían los Hititas).

Tendrán que enfrentarse a innumerables enemigos, por el norte los Kas-kas, por el este con los del imperio de mitani, también llamados hurritas (sus eternos enemigos), por el sur con los diversos pueblos de Siria, los de la ciudad de Ugalit, los amorreos, etc, por el oeste con otros pueblos como los Aswuan (o algo parecido).

La imagen que se obtiene es que en ese mundo existían innumerables pueblos que correspondían con ciudades-estado, que en un momento de la historia están en su apogeo y a los pocos años en decadencia. Tal es así que en no pocas ocasiones los Hititas son arrasados por alguno de estos pueblos, como los kas-kas que viven en el norte y a los que nunca conseguirán someter completamente.

Poco a poco, los hititas se hacen con un importante imperio, llegando a enfrentarse con los Asirios (al final de su imperio), con los de Babilonia, y con el todo poderoso Egipto, con Ramses II, en la famosa batalla de Kadest (cerca de Palestina) que los Egipcios representarán en el no menos famoso templo de Ramses II en Abu-sim-bel, y lo celebrarán como una gran batalla. Sin embargo la cosa no está nada clara, ya que otras fuentes nos hablan de victoria de los Hititas, pero en ningún caso de una victoria aplastante. Según el autor es más probable que se acerque a la verdad la versión de los Hititas, ya que sería un tanto inexplicable que si venció Ramses II, fuera acosado por el ejército Hitita cuando se retiraba y que a la postre la batalla le sirviera para perder territorios que antes dominaba y para perder influencia en las tierras de Oriente Medio. Lo más lógico es que Ramses II se retirara de la batalla, aunque la victoria Hitita no fuese una victoria excesivamente clara.

Un ensayo muy aconsejable para acercarse al mundo de los Hititas, en relación a su política militar de expansión, no así en relación a sus costumbres, religión, sociedad, etc.

[Peter Levi · Rating 5 out of 5]

For those interested in what we know of the historical Hittites this is an accessible, enjoyable read. Bryce does indulge in a couple of theories (about the origins of Troy and the influence of the Greeks, as well as the northern tribes he believes lead to the Hittites downfall), but they have some evidence to back them and are interesting to look at. Well worth delving into.

[Jen]

Didn't have time to finish reading, but was interesting to skim through. I may do more research on this particular culture eventually- they seem similar to the Sumerians/Babylonians, but with enough differences to make me want to research.

Saving the rest for when I have more time...

[Yasin]

Kronoloji takıntısını aşarak anlatıyı temel problemler üzerine kurması sadece akademik değil ortalama okuyucuya da hitap eden bir lezzet vermiş. Filolojik kaynaklar ile arkeolojik veriler arasında kurulan denge ufak detaylar dışında itiraza yer bırakmıyor.

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good overview of civilization that most people are unaware even existed. A little densely written at points, but very interesting.

[Didi Nguyen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well researched and well written

[George · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books that I have read in my life. Well researched and enjoyable.