Hittites

The Hittites were a northern Indo-European people who called themselves “Aryans” (like the Persians)—a term meaning “noble people”, they established an empire formally known as the Kingdom Of Hatti which stretched from Anatolia (modern Turkey), Canaan (Palestine and Jordan) and Syria to northern Mesopotamia (northern Iraq). It's capital was Hattusa, located in northeastern Turkey.

In 1650 B.C., they were able to gain control of most of Mesopotamia largely because of their advanced warfare, including horse-drawn chariots. Under their rule, life in the Babylonian empire did not flourish artistically or culturally as it did under others’ rule.

In the Old Testament, the Hittites are mentioned more than 50 times, and are described as having descended from Ham's grandson Heth (Gen 10:15). Biblical references to the Hittites include Abraham’s purchase of a burial site from Ephron the Hittite (Gen 23:1-20; 25:7-10) and King David's murder of Uriah the Hittite to cover up his sin with Bathsheba (2 Sam. 11:3-27).

Because no trace of this ancient civilization could be found for a long time, skeptics claimed it proved that the Bible was an unreliable source. However, in 1906-1907 and 1911-1912 when thousands of cuneiform tablets were discovered in Boghaz-keui a Hittite capital. The finds did much to further the credibility of the Bible as a historical record.

The Hittites were an important power in the 14th and 13th centuries B.C. and their expansion towards the Red Sea brought them into conflict with Egypt, leading to numerous skirmishes and battles of which the Battle Of Kadesh was the most important.

The Battle Of Kadesh was a result from growing tension between the superpowers of the ancient near east, Egypt, Hatti and Assyria, these nations were competing over the smaller states. One of these small states was Amurru, located in present day Syria, after it had been under Hittite influence during the 14th century B.C. it defected to Egypt in 1299 B.C.

When the Hittites threatened to restore their power through means of violence, Amurru pleaded with Pharaoh Rameses II for help in 1274 and got it in the form of two Egyptian divisions, one of which, lead by Rameses II himself was ambushed near the village of Kadesh by a numerically superior Hittite chariot force, but the other division arrived just in time to prevent an Egyptian defeat. Although the battle ended in a draw, Egypt gave up its colonies in Syria.

For Rameses II, who was in just in his 5th year of his reign, Kadesh was a test that he had to pass to gain the respect of the Egyptian aristocracy.

In 1258 B.C. Egypt and Hatti signed the world's first known peace treaty (a copy of which hangs on the walls of the United Nations headquarters), which also established an alliance against Assyria. The two states coexisted peacefully for seventy years, but by then Hatti had been weakened by Assyria and was sacked by the "Sea Peoples" a loose coalition of which the Philistines were a member.

Although Egypt was also attacked it was able to drive the attackers back and continue to prosper, Hatti however never recovered and continued to decline until the official fall of the kingdom around 1160 B.C.

After the kingdom had fallen, most of its former territories were annexed by Assyria, with some Hittite city-states remaining independent until the 8th century B.C.

References

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