changes with the change of the angle of the sun, the deities appear to
emerge slowly from their rock dwellings, atfirst faintly, but then with
ever-increasing clarity, as they respond to calls for their presence at
the festivals held in their honour.
THE FESTIVAL YEAR
The New Year festival was but one of a multiplicity of festivals that
dominated the Hittite religious year. That’sreflected in the
enormous number of festival texts that have come to light,
particularly in the archives of Hattusa, far exceeding the total
number of documents belonging to all other genres.‘Not another
festival text,’you can almost hear the excavators groan when a new
tablet is unearthed–and proves to be just that. One hundred and
sixty-five festivals or more were included in the religious calendar,
and there may well have been many others of a purely local-
community nature that were never preserved in written form.
The major festivals were closely linked with the year’smajor
seasons, understandable in a society whose survival depended so
much on its agricultural productivity. Of the four most important
festivals, two were held in spring and at least one in autumn.
And some went on for many days like the spring AN.TAH.SUM
festival, held in honour of‘the Sun Goddess of Arinna and the gods of
the Hatti Land’. This lasted 38 days, and was celebrated partly in the
capital and subsequently in other religious centres of the homeland.
Pilgrimages to these centres was an important part of being king, and
at least some of them contained royal residences to accommodate His
Majesty while he was there for festival celebrations (as well as for
other reasons). For the king was expected to participate personally in
all major festivals, as the gods’chief representative on earth, and was
likely to offend his divine lords if he did not, sometimes with dire
consequences for the kingdom. Sometimes he put off a military
campaign to fulfil his obligation to attend certain festivals, though as
with other responsiblities there were times when he delegated his
religious duties to other members of his family.
Much as we might feel that we have more than enough festival
texts, they do give us a very good idea of what a festival programme
248 WARRIORS OF ANATOLIA