The story of İnandıktepe

In 1965, workers on this hill in Çankırı Province stumbled on pottery shards of the famous İnandık vase, and that chance find led to excavations here in 1966 and 1967. The mound, 115 kilometers northwest of the Hittite capital Hattusa, holds five levels, most of them from the Hittite Age. Along its entire ridge lies a complex of about 2000 square meters, destroyed in a great fire and preserved only in parts.

The excavators believed it was a temple, though some suggest it was an estate. Most finds were ceramics: small vessels, jugs, a bull figurine, a temple model and even a tub.

Most revealing was a clay tablet in Akkadian recording a land gift of the official Tutulla, sealed with the archaic royal Tabarna seal, which places it in the late 16th century BC.