Kataḫḫa or Kataḫḫi was a name or title of multiple goddesses worshiped in ancient

Anatolia Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean ...

Hattians The Hattians () were an ancient Bronze Age people that inhabited the land of ''Hatti'', in central Anatolia (modern Turkey). They spoke a distinctive Hattian language, which was neither Semitic languages, Semitic nor Indo-European languages, In ...

and

Hittites The Hittites () were an Anatolian peoples, Anatolian Proto-Indo-Europeans, Indo-European people who formed one of the first major civilizations of the Bronze Age in West Asia. Possibly originating from beyond the Black Sea, they settled in mo ...

, with the best known example being the tutelary deity of Ankuwa. It has been proposed that goddesses sharing this name were associated with nature and wildlife. In Ankuwa, Kataḫḫa was the head of the local pantheon. Goddesses with the same name were also worshiped in Katapa and other nearby settlements. The goddesses of Ankuwa and Katapa additionally appear in diplomatic treaties. The former was also worshiped in Zippalanda, though it is not certain if she was related in any way to the main local deity, the weather god of Zippalanda.

Name and character

The theonym Kataḫḫa is derived from the Hattic word ''katta-'', "queen". Multiple writings are attested, for example ''Ka-taḫ-ḫa'', Ka-at-taḫ-ḫa, ''Ka-taḫ-ga'', ''Ḫa-tág-ga'' and ''Ḫa-taḫ-ḫa''. In the oldest texts the name was spelled with an ''i'', rather than ''a'', as the final

vowel A vowel is a speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract, forming the nucleus of a syllable. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness a ...

. It could also be represented by the Sumerogram ^d MUNUS. LUGAL, which can be translated as "the divine queen". Multiple goddesses from central Anatolia could be referred to with the name Kataḫḫa, with the city goddess of Ankuwa being the best known. proposes that multiple Anatolian goddesses sharing names or titles which can be translated as "queen", Hattian Kataḫḫa or Hittite Ḫaššušara, can all be understood as nature deities linked to wildlife. He also suggests that deities such as Ammamma, Tetešḫapi and had similar character.

Worship

Kataḫḫa is best attested as the tutelary goddess of the city of Ankuwa. She was also the head of the local pantheon. Maciej Popko has proposed that Ankuwa was located between

Hattusa Hattusa, also Hattuşa, Ḫattuša, Hattusas, or Hattusha, was the capital of the Hittites, Hittite Empire in the late Bronze Age during two distinct periods. Its ruins lie near modern Boğazkale, Turkey (originally Boğazköy) within the great ...

and the Pontic Mountains, but this view is not universally accepted. A text from the reign of

Ḫattušili III Hattusili III (Hittite language, Hittite: "from Hattusa") was king of the Hittite empire (New Kingdom) –1245 BC (middle chronology) or 1267–1237 BC (short chronology timeline)., pp.xiii-xiv Early life and family Much of what is known about ...

, KUB 15.1, describes a fire which took place in Ankuwa, and states that the king invoked Kataḫḫa, the " weather god of heaven" and the weather god of Zippalanda to try to stop it, promising each of these deities a silver model of the city and eight sheep as an offering if they will stop it. In treaties, Kataḫḫa of Ankuwa appears as one of the members of a group referred to as "queen goddesses" in Hittitology, which also includes

Ḫuwaššanna Ḫuwaššanna was a goddess worshiped in Hittite religion and Luwian religion in the second millennium BCE. Her name could be written phonetically or using the logogram dingir, dGazbaba, GAZ.BA.BA and its variants. She was the main goddess of the ...

of Ḫupišna, Ḫantitaššu of Ḫurma, Abara of Šamuḫa, ^dŠARRAT of Katapa, Ammamma of , Ḫallara of Dunna, Tapišuwa of Išḫupitta, ^dBELTI, Kuniywanni of Landa and ^dNIN.PISAN.PISAN of Kinza. According to Oğuz Soysal it can be assumed the goddess of Katapa can also be identified as a local form of Kataḫḫa. This city, as well as two further cult centers of Kataḫḫa, Šalampa and Tawiniya, were located in the proximity of Ankuwa. Furthermore, the goddess bearing this name associated with Ankuwa was venerated in Zippalanda as well. The two cities shared close religiously motivated ties with each other. However, it remains uncertain what, if any, relation existed between Kataḫḫa of Ankuwa and the weather god of Zippalanda, and while it has been proposed both that they were viewed as a couple or as a mother and son, neither view found universal acceptance among Hittitologists. A sanctuary dedicated to Kataḫḫa also existed in

. Additionally, she was worshiped during a festival of Telipinu held in Ḫanḫana and Kašḫa. A festival focused on Kataḫḫa is described in the text CTH 633. It was referred to with the term ''ḫaššumaš'' (often translated as "procreation" or "begotten"), and seemingly took place in both Hattusa and Ankuwa. The opening ceremony likely took place in the temple of Kataḫḫa in the former of the two cities. It had to be performed by the king, but a prince (DUMU.LUGAL) presided over most of the ritual activities. In an early study of the available sources, Hans Gustav Güterbock proposed that it might have served as an initiation into adulthood for a young member of the royal family, but this interpretation has been challenged by Ada Taggar-Cohen, who argues it was instead an example of state religion, and that its goal was simply to acquire the favor of a specific local deity for the ruler.

References

Bibliography

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