Rituals made for Hittite king statues in the light of written documents

Cult practices and cult objects have a extremely significant place in the Hittite religion. The statues of Hittite kings appear as cult objects in cuneiform tablets. In the political, historical, and religious texts found in the Hittite archives, the king statues are seen for various purposes. These statuses in question have various purposes according to the political, historical, and religious texts in the Hittite archives. The purpose of use of these statues and the practices used these statues constitute the main subject of our study. This study, which has been carried out by considering the hypothesis that whether the statues of the Hittite kings are a cult object or a main kingly cult, has been discussed in the light of philological and archaeological data and has been examined in three main chapters. In the first chapter, where philological data are evaluated, it has been determined in which text groups and in which function concepts of statues, figures, models and copy etc. were used in the cuneiform texts. A terminological study has been conducted and whether terms used or not for the statues of the Hittite kings has been determined in this chapter. In addition, cuneiform texts in which Hittite king statues are seen have been addressed. Philological evaluation continues in the second chapter. Hittite transliteration and translation of the texts regarding the text group on Sacrifice for the Royal Statues − CHT 660 consisting of 29 tablets and 41 fragments in total − have been performed in the second chapter. As a result of the text edition, the reconstruction of the Sacrifice ritual for the Royal Statues has been generated. V In the third chapter, the king descriptions found on the Hittite rock monuments and Hittite seals have been investigated, under the title of Archaeological Data. Moreover, statues and figurines which have been unearthed in archaeological excavations and might be the depiction of the king have been discussed in this chapter. In the light of data used in this study, it has been determined that the statues of the Hittite kings and queens were constructed for a royal cult. Our main findings indicate the existence of the cult of the Hittite royal statue