Despite the painful development of the political unification of the Hittite state, at the beginning of his reign Hattusili was also engaged in several military expeditions outside of Hatti. In this regard, valuable information can be found in the bilingual annals of the king. These are written in both Hittite and Akkadian and recount year by year the feats of his first six years of rule (Text 21). The fights with nearby Shanahuitta and the powerful Zalpa took place at the same time as the long-distance expeditions and the disastrous incursions of enemies into the heart of Hatti. At the time, the Hittite state was still poorly unified, but already quite a large state. Consequently, its rise did not take place from a compact centre that was gradually expanding. It happened through ambitious expeditions, followed by the slow consolidation of the centre.
At the beginning of his reign, Hattusili already controlled the central part of Anatolia, possibly from sea to sea. He reached the Black Sea through the conquest of Zalpa, and the Mediterranean through the conquest of Cilicia (Adana, Lawazantiya). To the west, the vast region of Arzawa remained independent. Hattusili led a campaign there in his third regnal year, forcing the region to become part of his kingdom. To the southeast between the Taurus and the Mesopotamian plain, a number of relatively powerful kingdoms remained independent including Hashshum (in the Maras area), Hahhum (Lidar Huyuk, near Samsat) and Urshum (in the Gaziantep area).
Two major powers were still looming behind these reigns, however. In Syria, there was the Old kingdom of Yamhad. The latter controlled a number of states in south-eastern Anatolia, such as Alalah, Carchemish and maybe Urshum. In Upper Mesopotamia, there was the rising land of Hurri. The latter was defined in the Old Hittite texts more as an ethnical group than a territorial state (i. e. ‘the Hurrians’, or ‘the Hurrian troops’). On the contrary, the Akkadian version of the annals already gives this territory the name of Hanigalbat. The area was divided among small Hurrian states from as early as the Mari Age and even in the Late Akkadian period. The innovation of these Hurrians attested in the Hittite sources was their unification into a state formation destined to play an important part in the history of the Near East.
Hattusili’s first expedition south of the Taurus took place in his second year on the throne. Having crossed Mount Adalur (a prosecution of the Amanus), the king marched straight south to Amuq. He destroyed Alalah, an important vassal of Aleppo, leaving no time for the latter to react. Before returning to Hatti, Hattusili moved east to conquer the land of Urshum. The following year, while Hattusili was engaged in conflicts with Arzawa, the Hurrians invaded the land with devastating effect. This action was certainly facilitated by the uncertain loyalty of several cities in the area. In his sixth reigning year, Hattusili again climbed the Adalur, defeated the troops of Hashshum, destroyed Hashshum itself and proceeded to conquer and destroy Hahhum. He then crossed the Euphrates, repeating the famous achievement of the legendary Sargon, though in the opposite direction. The fight against Hahhum had been prepared diplomatically. The Hittite king had the support of Tikunani, a small kingdom in Upper Mesopotamia that was still independent from the Hurrians. The conflicts continued in Syria even after the episodes recounted in the bilingual text. The difficulty of this conquest was mainly due to the active support the city-states between the Taurus and Euphrates received from Yamhad and the Hurrians.
These wars are also attested in some epic and legendary accounts. Some fragments attest to the names of the kings of Aleppo, Yarim-Lim and Hammurabi, as well as a general of Aleppo, Zukrashi, and the troops of the Umman-Manda. The most complete text describes the siege of Urshum. At that time, Hat-tusili was residing in Cilicia (Lawazantiya), while his generals were trying to conquer the city of Urshum unsuccessfully. This was due to a series of problems and counter-attacks by the besieged and their allies. We do not have the final part of the text, which maybe would have emphasised the decisive intervention of the king to repair for his generals’ incompetence. Despite being a literary text, it is based on the events of the time. Whichever way the siege of Urshum ended — the text would logically imply that it was indeed besieged — it is clear that Hattusili found in Syria an arduous opposition, which could not be defeated with the means available to him.
His expansions eventually reached completion under Mursili I, who returned to Syria, apparently to avenge his adoptive father, who was possibly injured in battle, or simply defeated. Mursili successfully managed to defeat the king of Yamhad and his allies. The contemporary sources do not provide as much information as the ones we have for the first wars of Hattusili. Nonetheless, Mursili’s success was so resounding that it was remembered in the following centuries. Both Telipinu and a fourteenth century treaty with Aleppo recall Mursili’s destruction of the ‘great kingdom’ of Yamhad as a memorable event. Aleppo itself must have been besieged and destroyed. In that same period, other centres under Aleppo’s authority, such as Ebla, were destroyed, probably at the hands of the Hittites themselves, or others linked to those events. This conquest of Ebla has already been mentioned: it is attested in the ‘Song of Liberation’, a text written in the Hurrian language, but kept in the Hittite archives.
We do not possess the details of the way in which Mursili ruled over his conquered territories. The king probably tried to maintain a Hittite presence there by appointing local dynasts dependent on the Hit-tite state. Mursili’s solid control over Syria is proven by the fact that he moved his troops beyond Syria, reaching Babylonia, which he plundered and then abandoned. After all, it was impossible for Mursili to establish a solid control in Babylonia. Moreover, his ambitions were clearly more modest, namely, to support Hana, maybe in exchange for Hana’s support in the Hittite conquest of Yamhad. In the case of Syria, Mursili clearly tried to establish a solid control of the region throughout his reign. Immediately after his reign, we find his successor Hantili engaged in battle with the Hurrians along the Euphrates, in particularly in Carchemish and the land of Ashtata (the valley between Carchemish and Hana). However, Hantili’s opposition to the Hurrians failed and northern Syria fell under their control. Therefore, in a way Syria experienced the same fate as Babylonia did with the Kassites: the political gap brought about by the Hittite destruction of Yamhad benefited a third state, a new power destined to last.
The Old Hittite presence in the international scene did not last long, but had important implications. In fact, it confirmed, in a sudden yet influential way, the existence of a new power, able to interact with, or fight against, the major powers in the Near East. This new power had access to resources that had been badly used before. This was largely due to the long political fragmentation of the region, rather than its geographical position. Anatolia certainly had a reputation for its wealth in raw materials and unique local culture. However, in previous phases Anatolia’s political fragmentation, which was much more established than in Mesopotamia, made its relations with the latter rather imbalanced. Therefore, once Anatolia was unified, the area inevitably became a major player among the foremost and most ancient powers of the Near East.
World History
