The Hittites were an ancient people of Asia Minor and Syria, who flourished from 1600 to 1200 BC. Trevor Bryce uses contemporary scholarship and archaeological discoveries to examine their society and civilization.

In dealing with a wide range of aspects of the life, activities, and customs of the Late Bronze Age Hittite world, this book complements the treatment of Hittite military and political history presented by the author in The Kingdom of the Hittites (OUP, 1998). It aims to convey to the reader a sense of what it was like to live amongst the people of the Hittite world, to participate in their celebrations, to share their crises, to meet them in the streets of the capital or in their homes, to experience the sights, sounds, and smells of a healing ritual, to attend an audience with the Great King, and to follow his progress in festival processions to the holy places of the Hittite land. Through quotations from the original sources and through the word pictures to which these give rise, the book aims at recreating, as far as is possible, the daily lives and experiences of a people who for a time became the supreme political and military power in the ancient Near East.

Lost to history for millennia, the Hittites have regained their position among the great civilizations of the Late Bronze Age Near East, thanks to a century of archaeological discovery and philological investigation. The Hittites and Their World provides a concise, current, and engaging introduction to the history, society, and religion of this Anatolian empire, taking the reader from its beginnings in the period of the Assyrian Colonies in the nineteenth century B.C.E. to the eclipse of the Neo-Hittite cities at the end of the eighth century B.C.E. The numerous analogues with the biblical world featured throughout the volume together represent a comprehensive and up-to-date survey of the varied and significant contributions of Hittite studies to biblical interpretation.

Translations from the original texts are a particular feature of the book. Thus on many issues the Hittites and their contemporaries are allowed to speak to the modern reader for themselves."--BOOK JACKET.

This book by Laura Zucconi is an accessible introductory text to the practice and theory of medicine in the ancient world. In contrast to other works that focus heavily on Greece and Rome, Zucconi’s Ancient Medicine covers a broader geographical and chronological range. The world of medicine in antiquity consisted of a lot more than Hippocrates and Galen. Zucconi applies historical and anthropological methods to examine the medical cultures of not only Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, and Rome but also the Levant, the Anatolian Peninsula, and the Iranian Plateau. Devoting special attention to the fundamental relationship between medicine and theology, Zucconi’s one-volume introduction brings the physicians, patients, procedures, medicines, and ideas of the past to light.

An accessible introduction to the Bronze Age culture in Asia Minor. Famed for their warriors, the Hittites flourished in the region of modern Turkey from the seventeenth to thirteenth centuries BC. In this book, archaeologist Damien Stone explores the rich history of the Hittite civilization beyond their skill in battle, from religious reverence for the sun and storms to eclectic rock carvings which survive to this day. Stone describes the colorful succession of Hittite rulers, complete with assassinations, intrigue, and an evil stepmother, but he also parses the development of the Hittite language and considers the Hittites’ legacy in religion, art, and culture today. In short, The Hittites is a wide-ranging, accessible introduction to this vibrant ancient culture.