Probably during the fifteenth century BC the Hittite ruling elite developed a second script, the Anatolian hieroglyphs, out of an already existing repertoire of symbols whose roots may go back to the Old Assyrian period. Egyptian inspiration for this script seems unlikely. Typologically, it fits in with an Aegaean script like Linear B but it may well be an originally Anatolian creation. Given the fact that the Luwian language became increasingly widespread within central Anatolia, that, where visible, Luwian is the language of the hieroglyphic inscriptions, and that the imported cuneiform and the Hittite language were never used for publicly displayed inscriptions, the creation and promotion of the hieroglyphs were part of the same attempt at unifying the kingdom. This chapter ends with a brief introduction to the Anatolian hieroglyphic script and system.

The hieroglyphic sign known as L.326 and supposedly picturing a tablet has been interpreted as the title “scribe” since 1956. Given the fact that it is the most frequently attested title on seals from the Hittite kingdom this would mean that literacy was widespread among the ruling elite of the Hittite state. It is argued in an excursus that both the iconographic rendering and the interpretation as “scribe” are flawed. Instead, it is proposed to portray a seat, indicating a high status for the person carrying the symbol on his seal. First, all Late Bronze Age evidence is passed in review, then the Iron Age evidence. As a consequence, some well-known Iron Age passages need to be re-interpreted.

This chapter gives an overview of all sources written in Anatolian hieroglyphs, that is, seals and inscriptions. Whereas cuneiform was the strictly internal means of communication within the kingdom, the hieroglyphs were used whenever the population at large was addressed. Given the sociolinguistic situation hieroglyphic inscriptions were written in Luwian, not in Hittite.