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Chapter 12 - In the Hittite Chancellery and Tablet Collections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2020

Theo van den Hout
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
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Summary

Hittite records can be classified as either short-term or long-term texts. Within the latter group we distinguish semi-current and permanent records. The various tasks of scribes working for the state are discussed in this chapter: drafting new documents, either from scratch or using earlier, related documents, copying and editing existing compositions, and reading. As part of the discussion about editing, an attempt is made to make sense of a number of closely related but still largely unclear technical terms found in many colophons. Finally, the question of tablet storage is addressed. Given the confusing archaeological context in which most Hittite tablets and fragments have been found there is little certainty to be gained. A case is made for a smaller rather than larger number of scribal “offices” and estimates of the original total of tablets present at any time in the tablet collections of the thirteenth century are discussed. An appendix gives a concrete example of what text editing might have looked like.

Type
Chapter
Information
A History of Hittite Literacy
Writing and Reading in Late Bronze-Age Anatolia (1650–1200 BC)
, pp. 234 - 286
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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