Into Turkey– Part Twenty-Five

On the way to Antioch on the Orontes where the followers of Christ were first called Christianoi, or partisans of Christ,  we stopped at a remarkable Hittite site, where statues were made.  The Hittites are perhaps one of the least well known ethnic groups when it comes to Bible readers, though they may remember Uriah was a Hittite, the first husband of Bathsheba.  In fact the Hittites carved out a considerable Empire which at one point in fact covered much of Turkey as well as other territory in the area.  One site very well worth visiting in the eastern part of Turkey is Hattusa, the Hittite capital.  So let’s have a look at this statue producing place…

First of all, some of the most important of these statues are now in the Antioch museum, including this very important ruler—-

Good luck pronouncing his name right.

I just love his helmet or crown.

But here is the site where such statues were made…

Here’s the caretaker of the site…

You may ask what do we make of these statues… well fortunately we have descriptions of the whole lot of them….

Below is a helpful map of Hittite sites in Anatolia, and you can see they are all over Turkey…

And when we were leaving Yesemek we got a bonus….