CTH 362, Haas 1989: 381; Onal 1994b: 8521; Pecchioii Daddi 2003; Haas 2006: 217ff.; Akdogan

Ka mm enh uber 1 964.

KUB 24.14 iv 19bfl, Kammenhuber 1964: 183: Girbal 1986: 99.

Lesignations of death and their interpretation, see van den Hout 1994a: 39fl; now also

Tpelus s paper (Gooa death, bad death. Keflections on the Hittite attitude towards death“)

At the 7th International Congress of Hittitology in Carum, 25-29 August 2008

:

■

The Empire Pbriod

159

Vowing gifts one could persuade a god into reversing iii fortime and putting off the

Moment of death; one could also avail oneself of magic, as exemplified by the Substi

Tute king rituals (3.2.9).

The term ‘(propitious) day’ (UD.(SIG ä)) refers to the moment of death that was

Perceived as a deity able to receive offerings (see 3.1.1). Death was also referred to

as ‘the day of one’s destiny’ or ‘the day of (one’s) mother.’ The latter term informs us

Of how the Hittites understood the process of dying. The underlying idea of this ex-

Pression may be that an individual’s mother who set him/her on this earth (lifting

Him/her up from the netherworld in a sense) is the one who will come at the time of

Death to take him/her once again from the power of the Sun-goddess of the Earth

948

and fetch him/her for his/her otherworldly existence in the rneadow of the blessed. '

Thus, “death is understood here as a kind of birth.” 949 In the royal funerary ritual

The Sun-goddess of the Earth is offered an effigy of the dead king as a substitute for

Him and sacrifices of food and drinks, all this probably meant to appease her and

Cause her to set the ghost of the king free (see below).

Death is a special passage because it entails a change of both state and Status.

It is a passage from the corporeal to the spiritual. At the point of death the soul

Departed from the body. The body was buried either as an inhumation or a crema-

951

Tion, the latter being the rale in the royal family under the Empire (see below).

Funerary rituals transferred the dead to the new everyday state in the other world

Where they existed in their new Status as spirits. The (ghost of the) dead person

(Hittite akkant-, GIDIM) also had a soul. The ghost’s relation to the soul “may be

Compared to that of soul and body before death, that is, the GIDIM may have been

conceived of as more ‘corporeal’ than the soul, as some immaterial but potential ly

Visible body.” 96 “

Having left the body, the soul embarked on a journey that was for it, a period of

Trial and tribulation. An incantation recited during a (funerary?) ritual for a dead

S48 For the rneadow of the netherworld in the Indo-European fcraditlon, see Puhvel 1989.

Beckman 1983: 237; cf, also van den Hout. 1994a: 42f. In many different culturea the transfer of

The ghost to the netherworld is connected with the symbolism of fertility and rebirth; see, e.g.,

Bloch — Parry (eds) 1982; A.C. Cohen 2005: 24f.

Taracha 1998b.

On the essence and significance of cremat.ion, see a commentary under 1.2, and below.

Van den Hout 19S4a; 44.

160

Hittite Anatolia

womaii describes the journey of her soul into the netherworld. 5 ' The text opposes

The meadow, which is where the soul is headed, to the evil tenawa, where “one

[does not] recognize (each other). Sisters having the same mother do [not! recog-

nize (each other). Brothers having the same father do [not] recognize (each other).

A mother does [not] recognize [her] own child. [A childj does [not] recognize fits ownj

mother. (...) From a fine table they do not eat. Front a fine trivet they do not eat. From

a fine cup they do not drink. (...) They eat bits of mud. They drink drainage

„955

waters. ' The description refers to the topos recurring in Babylonian mythology,

Which depicts the netherworld as a dark house whose inhabitants eat mud and clay. 956

In the mentioned text the road the soul takes is called the ‘great way.’ 957 Images