Cities

During the Late Bronze Age, from roughly the seventeenth to the early twelfth centuries BCE, Hittite rulers governed cities in central Anatolia and territories extending into northern Syria. Cities served several purposes at once: they could house royal administration, organise worship, store supplies and protect people and goods. Their form depended on local terrain, political role and history, so there was no single Hittite city plan. Hattusa, the imperial capital in central Anatolia, and Sarissa, a provincial centre, illustrate different ways these functions were arranged.

Hattusa had a long urban history. Assyrian merchants occupied a trading district there in the nineteenth and eighteenth centuries BCE, before the Hittite kingdom made it a royal capital. Later builders worked around the ridges, streets and earlier settlements of an already inhabited landscape.

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Capital and provincial centres

A capital concentrated royal and administrative functions, but its status could change. Around the middle of the seventeenth century BCE, Hattusili I established Hattusa as a royal centre. The royal citadel occupied the high ridge of Büyükkale, where the palace and administrative buildings stood. Hittite rulers later transferred the capital to Tarhuntassa under Muwatalli II, then returned it to Hattusa under Mursili III. The changes show that the royal seat was a political choice, not an unchanging feature of the kingdom.

Sarissa, known in Hittite texts as Šarišša, was a provincial town rather than a capital. Founded in the sixteenth century BCE, it lay in the region called the Upper Land in records kept at Hattusa. Texts associate it with visits by the king to perform rituals for the Weather-God. The town therefore served local communities while also having a place in royal religious practice. Its history, like Hattusa’s, included destruction and rebuilding: it was sacked during turmoil in the fourteenth century BCE and later rebuilt.

Layouts shaped by terrain and growth

Hattusa spread across uneven ground, with a relatively level area to the north and a steep rise to the south. Its buildings and walls made use of ridges, rock outcrops and slopes. The city included a lower town, an upper town and the citadel at Büyükkale. Walls enclosed the larger settlement and also divided parts of it, giving separate districts their own boundaries and controlled entrances. The outer circuit measured about 6.6 kilometres; including internal walls, the total length of fortifications exceeded nine kilometres.

The different districts reflect growth over time rather than one construction plan. Hattusa’s lower town and citadel formed early centres, while development of the upper town began by the sixteenth century BCE. Temples and other buildings were added or altered over successive generations. At Sarissa, archaeological evidence points to a more planned foundation: its upper town was laid out around an axial system of streets, and a lower town was added in the fourteenth century BCE. These examples show that a Hittite city could grow around an older settlement or be laid out more deliberately, depending on its circumstances.

Walls, gates and construction work

Hittite fortifications combined natural defences with built ones. At Hattusa, walls followed the terrain, while towers and additional sections protected important areas. The wall system used a form of cellular construction: parallel walls were joined by cross walls, creating compartments filled with earth, stones and broken mudbrick. This made a broad, substantial rampart. The foundations were built of dry-laid stone, with upper sections of timber framing and sun-dried mudbrick, usually protected by plaster. The surviving stonework is therefore only the base of a much taller structure.

The precise dates of Hattusa’s wall sections are not all known. The earliest major circuit is associated with King Hantili I in the late seventeenth or early sixteenth century BCE, though earlier construction cannot be ruled out. The southern defences and monumental gates also developed over time; parts of the upper town were probably fortified well before the final centuries of the empire. At Sarissa, excavated sections of the upper-town wall had two wall faces linked by cross walls, with towers and gates controlling access. Its lower-town circuit is known from its overall extent but has not been excavated.

Gates controlled movement as well as defending entrances. At Hattusa, major gates had wooden doors that turned on stone fittings and could be secured with bars. Some were decorated with carved lions, sphinxes or a warrior figure. Texts describing the duties of the hazannu, an official responsible for city security and upkeep, required gates to be closed and sealed at night and their seals checked in the morning. The procedure made access part of the city’s regular administration, not simply a matter of defence during an attack.

Construction demanded large quantities of materials and sustained labour. Between 2003 and 2005, Jürgen Seeher’s team reconstructed 65 metres of Hattusa’s wall using 64,000 mudbricks. Clay had to be mixed with straw and water, shaped into bricks and dried before the walls could rise above their stone bases. Timber supported upper structures, while plaster protected exposed mudbrick. The experiment made the scale of material preparation visible even along a short stretch of fortification.

Temples and water infrastructure

Temples were major urban institutions, not isolated shrines. They provided spaces for ritual and also required staff, supplies and storage. At Hattusa, the Great Temple in the lower town was surrounded by 82 long storerooms. Large storage jars held goods including grain, pulses, oil and wine. Priests and scribes worked within the temple complex, alongside people responsible for practical and craft tasks. In the upper town, a group of temples developed over several centuries. Some were later abandoned or replaced by workshops, a reminder that sacred districts could change as the city’s needs and royal arrangements changed.

Worship could also take place beyond a city’s walls. At Sarissa, texts describe the Huwasi stone, a sacred stone associated with the Weather-God, outside the town. An excavated pool and shrine nearby may relate to this place of worship, though the identification is uncertain. Such evidence points to a relationship between the built city and ritual places in its surrounding landscape.

Water management had to address both supply and drainage. Hattusa had natural springs, supplemented by cisterns and artificial ponds. Some ponds were lined with clay and edged with stone; a group of smaller reservoirs helped avoid dependence on a single large basin. Researchers have proposed that groundwater seepage helped fill some of them. At Sarissa, archaeologists identified a pool or dam by the north-west gate, another example of water infrastructure within a town’s planned spaces.

Storage, maintenance and urban life

Large stores helped cities manage supplies. At Hattusa, eleven grain-storage pits have been identified on Büyükkaya. The largest measured 12 by 18 metres and was more than two metres deep, with a capacity of at least 260 tonnes. This was bulk storage on a scale that required planned spaces and organised handling. The city’s position and population also meant that supplies depended on the surrounding agricultural region.

Streets and drains required continuing attention. At Hattusa, paved roads and channels beneath them are known in some areas. The drainage system carried rainwater and included connections for household wastewater. Texts assigned the hazannu responsibility for keeping channels clear, linking everyday maintenance to the same office that supervised the city gates. Urban systems worked only when people maintained them.

Hattusa was gradually abandoned in the early twelfth century BCE as the Hittite kingdom broke apart. Some fires appear to have followed the departure of the royal court and administration. Its districts preserve a long sequence of construction and reuse: streets were repaired, temples changed function, and storage areas were reorganised as the capital’s needs developed.

For the wider setting, see Hittite historical context.