Arnuwanda’s litany of complaints against him. Seeking to carve out
a mini-empire for himself in southwestern Anatolia, he invaded
Arzawa, in defiance of the express instruction of his overlord. But
he achieved nothing except a massive retaliatory attack from the
Arzawan king Kupanta-Kurunta, who invaded and occupied his
land. Madduwatta was forced toflee for his life. Tudhaliya sent
Hittite troops to the rescue, who drove the enemy from his land
and restored it to him.
THE FUGITIVE TURNS TREACHEROUS
Then Attarissiya reappeared on the scene with his army, intent on
killing Madduwatta and seizinghis land. Once again, Madduwatta
fled before the invaders, and once again Tudhaliya despatched an
expeditionary force to expel the enemy. The mission successfully
completed, Madduwatta was once more reinstated in his land. But
Tudhaliya was now having serious doubts about his subject’s
trustworthiness–and his ultimate intentions. So he ordered the Hittite
expeditionary force to remain with Madduwatta for the time being, no
doubt to keep an eye on the serial fugitive’s conduct, and ensure that he
remained under control. But His Majesty was outwitted. Madduwatta
contrived to rid himself of his unwelcome guests by secretly plotting
with other nearby forces, who lured the Hittites into an ambush and
then set about destroying them and killing their commander.
Surprisingly, there seems to have been no retaliatory action
from Tudhaliya. At least none that we hear of. This emboldened
Madduwatta to go one step further by appearing to conclude an
alliance with the Hittites’arch-enemy, Kupanta-Kurunta, king of
Arzawa. The alliance was to be cemented by a marriage between
Madduwatta and K-K’s daughter in Madduwatta’s territory. K-K
was invited to attend the wedding. But it was all a put-up job, or so
Madduwatta wrote to his overlord,^2 to enable him to get K-K into
his clutches and then assassinate him.
The text becomes fragmentary at this point, but it seems that K-K
became suspicious of what his son-in-law-to-be was up to and called
the whole thing off. The Hittite king too seems to have been suspicious
of Madduwatta’s ultimate intentions. Even so, when the text becomes
68 WARRIORS OF ANATOLIA