Archaeologists will return in 2027 to Sarissa, a roughly 3,500-year-old Hittite city in central Türkiye’s Sivas province, after a long pause in excavations, local officials said on Monday.
Sivas Governor Yılmaz Şimşek toured the site near Başören village in the Altınyayla district with provincial culture and tourism director Aziz Erdoğan, who briefed him on the ancient settlement. The new excavation season will be carried out by a team from Istanbul University, the governor said, thanking German archaeologist Andreas Müller-Karpe and his team for their earlier work at the mound, known locally as Kuşaklı.
A royal religious centre
Sarissa served Hittite kings as a religious centre in the second millennium BC. Excavations between 1993 and 2005 uncovered a temple covering 4,600 square metres, where kings are believed to have come each spring for ceremonies honouring the Storm God, the chief deity of the Hittite pantheon.
Diggers also found 52 clay tablets and the remains of a palace. A rhyton, or ritual drinking vessel, in the shape of twin bulls from the site is now one of the highlights of the Sivas Archaeology Museum. Officials also describe Sarissa as linked to the earliest written agreement between the Hittites and Egypt, a claim that underlines its importance in local promotion of the site.
Visitors can still see the Suppitassu lake, an artificial pond regarded as one of the earliest examples of water engineering in Anatolia.
Part of a busy dig season
The Hittites ruled much of Anatolia from their capital Hattusa, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in neighbouring Çorum province, until the empire’s collapse around 1200 BC. Sarissa is far less visited, but renewed excavations could raise its profile for cultural tourism in a region better known for its Seljuk monuments.
The announcement adds to a run of archaeological news from across Türkiye this autumn, including 2,600-year-old seeds found in Daskyleion’s ‘Lydian kitchen’ and a knucklebone oracle inscription at ancient Kibyra. Foreigners planning a longer stay to explore Anatolia’s heritage can start with our moving to Turkey checklist.
Sources
- Sarissa Antik Kenti’nde kazılar yeniden başlıyor (Haberton)
- Sarissa Antik Kenti’nde kazılar 2027’de başlayacak (Habererk)
Photo: Klaus-Peter Simon / CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
