Aspects of Luwian Religion

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CHAPTER SIX ASPECTS OF LUWIAN RELIGION MANFRED HUTTER A. INTRODUCTION 'Text is not religion' is a well-known methodological principle in the study of religions, and one also might say 'language is not ethnicity'. When defining Luwian religion we have to rely upon both-namely texts in Luwian language, mainly from the second millennium BCE, because for this period the best-known Luwian topic is language. Judging from this philological and linguistic background we find some kind of Luwian 'identity' across southern and southwestern Anatolia, and there we have to seek Luwian culture. Sometimes it seems as if such a proper culture tries to escape our grasp: up to the present our knowledge about the Luwians comes almost exclusively from sources which have been found within the political units of the Hittite empire. Onofrio Carruba (1995b 63) mentions that the Luwians, though extending from the Aegean sea to Kizzuwatna and northern Syria, do not seem to have a culture or history of their own. It appears that language alone allows us to talk of Luwians at all. Maybe this lack of understanding is partly due to our own mis comprehension of Luwian history. Another reason why they partly escape our comprehension is that parts of the Luwian population possibly were not sedentary, but only half-sedentary (cf. Forlanini 1998 224). We further have to be aware that almost all the written sources at our disposition have not been found within the Luwian lands proper but mostly in the Hittite capital Hattusa. Therefore these sources may be limited, as they were preserved only in case they were of some (special) interest for Hittites-and not for Luwians in the first instance. Therefore describing Luwian religion has to consist in large part of reconstructing Luwian religion. .

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