Foodstuffs were the most frequent offerings. These included raw products like honey, oil, and fruit; processed foods such as flour, ghee, and cheese; and a wide array of baked goods, some of special shape or decoration (Hoffner 1974). Potable liquids (wine, beer, and milk) were employed in the frequent libations. Hittite deities enjoyed a diet far richer than that of the ordinary peasant, as evidenced most strikingly in their prodigious consumption of meat, sometimes in astounding quantities (in one festival 1,000 sheep and 50 oxen). The usual sacrificial animals in Hatti were the same domestic livestock whose meat humans also ate most frequently, sheep, goats, and bovines. Wild animals, such as gazelle, stag, bear, boar, and leopard, were only seldom offered. Dogs, swine, and horses were killed only for special purposes, primarily to appease chthonic or underworld forces or the dead (Collins 1990).
Sacrificial victims were to be ‘‘pure,’’ that is, healthy and unblemished. On occasion it was specified that a female animal be virgin, and sometimes the victim had to be of the same gender as the offerant. As a general rule, black animals were appropriate offerings for chthonic gods, white or light-colored ones for all other divinities. Although eagles and falcons already appeared infrequently in early rites, the sacrifice of fowl, usually through incineration, was introduced into Hatti rather late, as part of a Hurro-Luwian cult borrowed from southern Anatolia and Syria. Severe sanctions hung over temple workers who might be tempted to substitute their own inferior animals for prize specimens intended for a deity.
Non-food items, including silver, precious objects, parcels of land, and dependent persons, are mentioned in vows by which an individual promised gifts to the gods in return for divine favor, usually in the form of healing (Otten 1965). When delivered, these pledges presumably became part of the furnishings of temples or of the working capital of their associated economic establishments.
World History
