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Luwian Curses as Religious Discourse

  • Laura Puértolas Rubio EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: June 9, 2022
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Abstract

Luwian incantations embedded in Hittite ritual texts reflect local traditions and religious discourses of different parts of Anatolia and Northern Syria. Among the various types of Luwian incantations, this paper will focus on the contextual analysis of cuneiform Luwian curses related to the Kuwattalla and Puriyanni traditions. Curses will be studied as religious discourse, analysing how individual elements of the curse interplay with the general structure of the ritual text in which it is embedded. To do so, a comparative perspective will be applied. Hittite ritual texts coming from the same or adjacent areas and reflecting common religious traditions will be used to elucidate difficult passages. This study may contribute to improve our understanding of Luwian texts as well as to highlight local concepts related to witchcraft.


Note

Post-doctoral researcher at the UMR 8167 “Orient et Méditerranée” (CNRS) within the framework of the project “Luwili: Luwian Religious Discourse Between Anatolia and Syria” (ANR-17-FRAL-0007-01/YA 472/2–1), which is a Franco-German research project funded by the ANR (Agence Nationale de la Recherche) and the DFG (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft), co-directed by Alice Mouton and Ilya Yakubovich.


Acknowledgements

This paper issues from my work in the project “Luwili: Luwian Religious Discourse Between Anatolia and Syria” (ANR-17-FRAL-0007-01/YA 472/2–1), which is a Franco-German research project funded by the ANR (Agence Nationale de la Recherche) and the DFG (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft), co-directed by Alice Mouton and Ilya Yakubovich. I am grateful to Alice Mouton and Ilya Yakubovich for their comments on this paper. I remain responsible for any mistakes. All the transliterations and translations presented here are the result of my personal collation of the photographs of the tablets from the Hethitologie Portal Mainz website (https://www.hethport.uni-wuerzburg.de/HPM/index.php). Therefore, my translations may differ from those of other authors.

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Published Online: 2022-06-09
Published in Print: 2022-06-08

© 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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