Who are the Luwians?

Luwian Studies ^ | up to and including 2019 | unattributed

[SunkenCiv]

A gap between linguistics and prehistory

Thanks to the over 33,000 documents from Hattusha, the capital of the Hittite Kingdom, linguists have been able to gain a comprehensive insight into Luwian culture. Some fundamental publications include the book Arzawa, by Susanne Heinhold-Krahmer (1977); The Luwians, edited by H. Craig Melchert (2003); and Luwian Identities, edited by Alice Mouton and others (2013). Field-oriented excavating archaeologists, on the other hand, never mention Luwians in their explanatory models. The current knowledge regarding the Aegean Bronze Age has been summarized in a number of recently published voluminous works, without attention to any Luwian culture.

For a number of reasons discussed elsewhere, recognition of a Luwian civilization seems to have been delayed. The gap between linguistics and prehistory regarding the investigations of the Luwians has existed for almost a century, since Emil Forrer, the Hittitologist who first identified the Luwian language in the tablets from Hattusha, recognized the significance of the Luwians as early as 1920.

Today, the term "Luwian" is well-established to denote a language, a script and an ethno-linguistic group of people who commanded either one or both of them. Since most Luwian hieroglyphic documents have thus far been found in Early Iron Age Syria and Palestine, the term Luwian is often used to denote people at the eastern end of the Mediterranean during the 10th and 9th century BCE. However, Luwian hieroglyphic script occurs as early as 2000 BCE in western and southern Asia Minor as well. Therefore, the term Luwian is also applied to the indigenous people who lived in western and southern Anatolia -- in addition to the Hattians -- prior to the arrival of the Hittites and during the Hittite reign.

[SunkenCiv]

It starts a bit weak, but I put it back on during work, and started to pay more attention around the 33 minute mark, getting good.

Lost Worlds investigates the very latest archaeological finds at three remote and hugely significant sites - Angkor Wat, Troy and Persepolis. Lost Worlds travels to each site and through high-end computer graphics, lavish re-enactment and the latest archaeological evidence brings them to stunning televisual life. From the 900-year-old remains of Angkor Wat in the Cambodian jungle the staggering City of the God Kings is recreated. From Project Troia, in North West Turkey, the location of the biggest archaeological expedition ever mounted the lost city is stunningly visualised and finally from Persepolis the city and the great Persian Empire are brought to life.

How Archaeologists Found The Lost City of Troy | Lost Worlds | Timeline | November 2, 2017