ABSTRACT BOOK Assyrian Influence in South-Eastern Anatolia and Northern Syria in the First Half of the 1st Millenium BCE – the Evidence of the So-Called Neo-Hittite Seals Agata KUBALA University of Wroclaw
[email protected] In the period between the 10th and the 8th centuries BCE the area of south-eastern Anatolia and northern Syria was occupied by small political units established by the Luwians that arose after the collapse of the Hittite Empire and population movements at the end of the 12th century BCE. The area over which the Luwians seized power was inhabited by an ethnically mixed population and the kingdoms founded by the newcomers, commonly referred as to Neo-Hittite, were in fact mult-ethnic and multi-cultural in their composition. This ethnic mix as well as intensive contacts with neighbouring peopoles found their reflection in the material remains of these kingdoms. The complexity of what we call Neo-Hittite culture is best illustrated by small glyptic products which iconographic repertoire most fully reflects the fusion of Hittite artistic achievements and foreign decorative motifs. Decoration of some of the seals recognized as Neo-Hittite contains separate motifs or whole scenes which prototypes are to find in Assyrian art, both from the Middle and the Neo-Assyrian period. The history of Neo-Hittite kingdoms was namely determined by their relationship to Assyria. Contacts of the Neo-Hittite states with the Neo-Assyrian Empire are attested by Assyrian historical records as early as the reign of Assurnasirpal II who initiated strong expansionist policy of the Assyrian Empire to the west.