Hayasa-Azzi

Location of Hayasa-Azzi

Hittite inscriptions deciphered in the 1920s by the Swiss scholar Emil Forrer testify to the existence of a mountain country, the Hayasa and/or the Azzi, lying around Lake Van. Several prominent authorities agree in placing Azzi to the north of Ishuwa. Others see Hayasa and Azzi as identical.

Records of the time between Telipinu and Tudhaliya III are sketchy. The Hittites seem to have abandoned their capital at Hattusa and moved to Sapinuwa under one of the earlier Tudhaliya kings. In the early 14th century BC, Sapinuwa was burned as well. Hattusili III records at this time that the Azzi had "made Samuha its frontier."

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Map of Ancient Middle East - ca. 1325 BC[1]

Tudhaliya III chose to make the city of Samuha, "an important cult centre located on the upper course of the Marassantiya river"[2] as a temporary home for the Hittite royal court sometime after his abandonment of Hattusa in the face of attacks against his kingdom by the Kaska, Hayasa-Azzi and other enemies of his state. Samuha was, however, temporarily seized by forces from the country of Azzi.[3] At this time, the kingdom of Hatti was so besieged by fierce attacks from its enemies that many neighbouring powers expected it to soon collapse. The Egyptian pharaoh, Amenhotep III, even wrote to Tarhundaradu, king of Arzawa: "I have heard that everything is finished and that the country of Hattusa is paralysed."(EA 31, 26-27)[4] However, Tudhaliya managed to rally his forces; indeed, the speed and determination of the Hittite king may have surprised Hatti's enemies including the Kaska and Hayasa-Azzi.[5] Tudhaliya sent his general Suppiluliuma, who would later serve as king himself under the title Suppiluliuma I, to Hatti's northeastern frontiers, to defeat Hayasa-Azzi. The Hayasans initially retreated from a direct battle with the Hittite commander. The Hittitologist Trevor R. Bryce notes, however, that Tudhaliya and Suppiluliuma eventually:

invaded Hayasa-Azzi and forced a showdown with its king Karanni (or Lanni) near the city of Kumaha. The passage (in the 'Deeds of Suppiluliuma') recording the outcome of this battle is missing. But almost certainly, the Hittite campaign resulted in the conquest of Hayasa-Azzi, for subsequently Suppiluliuma established it as a Hittite vassal state, drawing up a treaty with Hakkana, its current ruler.[6]

The Hayasans were now obliged to repatriate all captured Hittite subjects and cede "the border [territory] which Suppiluliuma claimed belonged to the Land of Hatti."[7] Despite the restrictions imposed upon Hakkani, he was not a completely meek and submissive brother-in law of the Hittites in political and military affairs. As a condition for the release of the thousands of Hittite prisoners held in his domain, he demanded first the return of the Hayasan prisoners confined in Hatti.

During their reigns, the cuneiform tablets of Boğazköy begin to mention the names of three successive kings who ruled over a state of Hayasa and/or Azzi. They were Karanni, Mariya, and Hakkani (or Hukkana). Hakkani, married a Hittite princess. When Suppiluliuma had become king himself, Hakkani proceeded to marry Suppiluliuma's sister.

In a treaty signed with Hakkani, Suppiluliuma I mentions a series of obligations of civil right:

My sister, whom I gave you in marriage has sisters; through your marriage, they now become your relatives. Well, there is a law in the land of the Hatti. Do not approach sisters, your sisters-in law or your cousins; that is not permitted. In Hatti Land, whosoever commits such an act does not live; he dies. In your country, you do not hesitate to marry your own sister, sister-in law or cousin, because you are not civilized. Such an act cannot be permitted in Hatti.

The kingdom of Hayasa-Azzi remained a loyal Hittite vassal state for a time, perhaps hit by the same plague which claimed Suppiluliuma and his son Arnuwanda II. But, in Mursili's seventh year (three years before Mursili's eclipse - so, 1315 BC), the "lord of Azzi" Anniya took advantage of Pihhuniya's unification of the Kaskas and raided the Land of Dankuwa, a Hittite border region, where he transported its population back to his kingdom.

Cavaignac wrote of that period that Anniya "had sacked several districts and refused to release the prisoners taken." Anniya's rebellion soon prompted a Hittite response. The Hittite King Mursili II, having defeated Pihhuniya, marched to the borders of Hayasa-Azzi where he demanded Anniya return his captured subjects.[8] When Anniya refused, Mursili immediately attacked the Hayasa's border fortress of Ura.[9] In the following spring, he crossed the Euphrates and re-organized his army at Ingalova which, about ten centuries later, was to become the treasure-house and burial-place of the Armenian kings of the Arshakuni Dynasty. One of the captured fortresses lay on the west side of Lake Van.

Despite Mursili's Year 7 and probable Year 8 campaigns against Hayasa-Azzi, Anniya was still unsubdued and continued to defy the Hittite king's demands to return his people at the beginning of Mursili's Ninth year.[8] Then, in the latter's Year 9, Anniya launched a major counter-offensive by once again invading the Upper Land region on the Northeast frontier of Hatti, destroying the Land of Istitina and placing the city of Kannuwara under siege.[10] Worse still, Mursili II was forced to face another crisis in the same year with the death of his brother Sarri-Kusuh, the Hittite viceroy of Syria. This prompted a revolt by the Nuhašše lands against Hittite control.[11] Mursili II took decisive action by dispatching his general Kurunta to quell the Syrian rebellion while he sent another general, the able Nuwanza (or Nuvanza) to expel the Hayasa-Azzi enemy from the Upper Land. After consulting some oracles, the king ordered Nuwanza to seize the Upper Land territory from the Hayasan forces. This Nuwanza did by inflicting a resounding defeat against the Hayasa-Azzi invaders; henceforth, Upper Land would remain "firmly in Hittite hands for the rest of Mursili's reign under the immediate authority of a local governor appointed by the king."[12] While Mursili II would invade and reconquer Hayasa-Azzi in his tenth year,[13] its formal submission did not occur until the following year of the Hittite king's reign.[12]

The Annals of Mursili describe the campaigns of Mursili against Hayasa-Azzi below:[14]

The people of Nahasse arose and besieged" (name indecipherable). "Other enemies and the people of Hayasa likewise. They plundered Institina, blockaded Ganuvara with troops and chariots. And because I had left Nuvanzas, the chief cup-bearer, and all the heads of the camp and troops and chariots in the High Country, I wrote to Nuvanzas as follows; 'See the people of Hayasa have devastated Institina, and blockaded the city of Ganuvara.' And Nuvanza led troops and chariots for aid and marched to Ganuvara And then he sent to me a messenger and wrote to me; 'Will you not go to consult for me the augur and the foreteller? Could not a decision be made for me by the birds and the flesh of the expiatory victims?

And I sent to Nuvanza this letter: 'See, I consulted for you birds and flesh, and they commanded, Go! because these people of Hayasa, the God U, has already delivered to you; strike them!

And as I was returning from Astatan to Carchemish, the royal prince Nana-Lu came to meet me on the road and said, 'The Hayasan enemy having besieged Ganuvara, Nuvanza marched against him and met him under the walls of Ganuvara. Ten thousand men and seven hundred chariots were drawn up in battle against him, and Nuvanza defeated them. There are many dead and many prisoners.

(Here the tablets are defaced, and 15 lines lost.)

And when I arrived in Tiggaramma, the chief cup-bearer Nuvanza and all the noblemen came to meet me at Tiggaramma. I should have marched to Hayasa still, but the chiefs said to me, 'The season is now far advanced, Sire, Lord! Do not go to Hayasa.' And I did not go to Hayasa.

Mursili, himself, could now take satisfaction in the reduction of the hostile and aggressive kingdom of Hayasa-Azzi once more to a Hittite vassal state.[15] After Anniya's defeat, Hayasa-Azzi never appears again in the Hittite (or Assyrian) records as a unified nation. Hayasa as a fighting power was practically eliminated by the expedition of Mursili II.

The similarity of the name Hayasa to the endonym of the Armenians, Hayk or Hay and the Armenian name for Armenia, Hayastan has prompted the suggestion that the Hayasa-Azzi confederation was involved in the Armenian ethnogenesis, or perhaps had been an Armenian-speaking state. One theory suggests that Hay derives from the Proto Indo-European word *h₂éyos (or possibly *áyos), meaning "metal." According to this theory, Hayasa meant "land of metal," referring to the early metallurgy techniques developed in the region.[16] The term Hayastan bears resemblance to the ancient Mesopotamian god Haya (ha-ià) and another western deity called Ebla Hayya, related to the god Ea (Enki or Enkil in Sumerian, Ea in Akkadian and Babylonian).[17] Thus, the Great Soviet Encyclopedia of 1962 posited that the Armenians derive from a migration of Hayasa into Shupria in the 12th century BC.[18] This is open to objection due to the possibility of a mere coincidental similarity between the two names.[19]

The region covered by Hayasa-Azzi would later constitute Lesser Armenia, as well as the western and south-western regions of Ancient Armenia. The main temples of many pre-Christian Armenian gods such as Aramadz, Anahit, Mher, Nane, and Barsamin were located in Hayasa.[20] The treasury and royal burials of the Arsacid (Arshakuni) dynasty would be located in this region as well during the 1st millennium BCE.[21]

The mentioning of the name Armenia can only be securely dated to the 6th century BC with the Orontid kings and very little is known specifically about the people of Hayasa-Azzi per se.[22]

Nevertheless, some scholars believe that Armenians were native to the Hayasa region, or perhaps moved into the Hayasa region from nearby northern or eastern regions (such as modern southern Georgia or northern Armenia).[23][24] A minority of historians theorize that after the Phrygian invasion of Hittites, the hypothetically named Armeno-Phrygians would have settled in Hayasa-Azzi, and merged with the local people, who were possibly already spread within the western regions of Urartu,[25] however, there is almost no evidence of an Armenian-Phrygian connection.

• Ishuwa
• Ancient regions of Anatolia
• Hurrians
• Phrygians
• History of the Hittites
• Indo-European languages

• Vyacheslav V. Ivanov & Thomas Gamkrelidze, "The Early History of Indo-European Languages", Scientific American; vol. 262, N. 3, 110-116, March 1990.