Kültepe, the site of the ancient Kaneš, has been excavated without interruption since 1948. In the lower town, the merchants’ harbor partly unearthed has yielded many artefacts and, up to now, 22,500 cuneiform clay tablets mainly written by Assyrian merchants established there during the 19^th and 18^th centuries BC. It has often been written that, without the tablets, it would have been almost impossible to detect the presence of the Assyrians at Kaneš. However, a closer look at the houses, their contents, as well as cultural and religious practices of their inhabitants, shows that this statement requires qualification. The study of the relationships between the Assyrians and the Anatolians in the lower town and their evolution over several generations allows a better understanding of the status of the Old Assyrian settlement at Kaneš.

Prof. Dr C. Michel is Director of Research at the CNRS, Archéologies et Sciences de l’Antiquité, Nanterre (France), co-PI of the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures, Hamburg (Germany), and member of the Kültepe excavation team.

Veenhof-lezing van het NINO en het RMO

De Veenhof-lezing werd in mei 2002 in het leven geroepen, naar aanleiding van het afscheid van professor Klaas Veenhof als hoogleraar talen en geschiedenis van Babylonië en Assyrië aan de Universiteit Leiden. De jaarlijkse lezing wordt georganiseerd door het Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten in samenwerking met het Rijksmuseum van Oudheden.