Hittite Building Rituals – Interaction between their Ideological Function and Find Spots

The German-Italian Vigoni-Project funded by the DAAD and MIUR/DIH seeks to undertake a new approach towards the interpretation of Hittite royal ideology. As the so called Hittite “building rituals” CTH 413-415 and CTH 725-726 show a long and important tradition for the king of building a temple or palace we chose them as a textual basis. Contrary to older investigations, we focus on the development of manuscripts and text groups by taking into account scribal customs as shapes of signs and tablets as well as the relationship of duplicate texts. Moreover, the content of the texts in combination with an analysis of find spots gives important hints towards an interpretation of mechanisms of storage of knowledge among the Hittites and its connection to kingship.