The Department of Archaeology of Bilkent University is pleased to invite you to the Lecture given by the Professor Fikri Kulakoğlu (Ankara University, DTCF): “Anatolia’s Prologue: Kültepe Kanesh-Karum” on Wednesday 14th of March 2018 at 17:40 PM (Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Humanities and Letters, Room H-132).
Abstract
The site of Kültepe, which was the capital of the ancient Kingdom of Kanesh and centre of a complex network of Assyrian trade colonies in the 2nd millennium B.C., is located 20 km to the northeast of the modern city of Kayseri. Situated just at the foot of Mount Erciyes (ancient Argeus) and on a fertile plain, Kültepe occupies a position at which historic and natural routes, leading from Sivas in the northeast and Malatya in the southeast, converge. This naturally advantageous position allowed Kültepe to emerge as a centre of importance in the world of ancient politics and trade. The large corpus of Old Assyrian cuneiform tablets (c. 23 000 in number) from this site has shed light not only on the history of Anatolia but also on the history of the entire ancient Near East. Kültepe was a key centre of culture and commerce between Anatolia, Syria, and Mesopotamia by the end of the 3rd millennium B.C. and especially during the first quarter of the 2nd millennium B.C.