Hattusha: The Forgotten City of a Thousand Gods

✍️ Shariq Ali
Valueversity

This is not a picture of Machu Picchu. It is, in fact, a glimpse of a great city that thrived in the heart of Anatolia two thousand years before Machu Picchu was even built. This was Hattusha, the capital of the Hittite Empire.

Hattusha was founded around 1600 BCE, near present-day Boğazkale in Turkey. The city was surrounded by massive walls stretching over six kilometers, featuring majestic gates like the Lion Gate and the Sphinx Gate. Its layout was an example of advanced urban planning for its time: the lower city was designated for the general population and temples, while the upper city housed palaces and sanctuaries.

Hattusha’s most valuable legacy lies in its libraries, where thousands of clay tablets inscribed in cuneiform script, in multiple languages, were preserved. Among these is the world’s first recorded peace treaty, signed between the Hittites and the Egyptians after the famous Battle of Kadesh.

Hattusha is also known as the “City of a Thousand Gods,” reflecting the polytheistic beliefs and rich religious culture of the Hittite people.

French archaeologist Charles Texier rediscovered the ruins in 1834, and in 1986, UNESCO declared Hattusha a World Heritage Site.

Today, Hattusha silently testifies to a time when history, faith, and diplomacy walked side by side.