The Ethnicity of the Sea Peoples - RePub - Erasmus Universiteit ...

war 199 – a suggestion further emphasized by the fact that
the name of the king of Wilusa at the time of Muwatallis
II, Alaksandus, corresponds to Greek Alexandros/Paris; 200
at any rate, a date of say c. 1280 BC for this conflict correlates
perfectly with the archaeologically established destruction
of Troy VI, usually assigned to c. 1300 BC.
Fig. 11 (see next page). Sites in southern and central Greece destroyed
and/or abandoned at the end of Late Helladic IIIB. Source:
Hope Simpson & Dickinson 1979.
shown are the following sites: Teikhos Dymaion, Pylos, Nikhoria,
Menelaion, Ayios Stephanos, Krisa, Tsoungiza, Mycenae, Zy-
199 So also Bryce 2003: 208, who, however, wrongly dates the
Tawagalawas-letter to the reign of Hattusilis III. It is interesting to
note in this connection that according to Webster 1960: 67 the Hittites
are mentioned in Homeros among the Trojan allies as 1. Halyzones
from Alybe – a city, like Hattusa, associated with silver –
(Iliad II, 856) [but note that Meyer 1968: 12 connects Alybe with
the Khalybians of the Early Iron Age], and 2. Keteians (Odyssey
XI, 521); they may further appear as adversaries of the Phrygians
along the Sangarios in form of Amazones in a retrospective passage
referring to the time that Priamos still fought himself (Iliad
III, 184) – the same Amazones upon whom Bellerophon stumbles
during his adventures in the hinterland of Lycia (Iliad VI, 186), cf.
Leonhard 1911: 15-6. See also section 2, notes 52 and 53 above.
200 Note that a reflection of these events is preserved by
Stephanos of Byzantion’s remark in his Ethnika, s.v. Samylia that
Motylos, after founding this Carian city, received Helena and Paris
there, see Riemschneider 1954: 40.
72
gouries, Berbati, Prosymna, Midea/Dendra, Tiryns, Orkhomenos,
Iria, Gla, Eutresis, Thebes, Brauron.
After this glorious episode, however, it goes down
with the image of the Mycenaean king in the eyes of the
Hittites. It has been argued that in the reign of the Hittite
great king Tud®aliyas IV (1239-1209 BC) the Mycenaeans
had lost their Anatolian bridgehead in the region of Miletos.
Thus there is documentary evidence that the ruler of
Milawata (= variant of Millawanda) at the time turned
sides and went over to the Hittite camp. 201 In the archaeological
record this seems to be reflected by Hittite features
in the material culture of Miletos in the second half of the
13th century BC. 202 Whatever the extent of these arguments,
fact is that in a treaty with Sausgamuwa of Amurru,
in which Tud®aliyas IV ordered a ban on traffic between
A®®iyawa and Assyria via the harbors of Amurru, the
name of the king of A®®iyawa, initially summed up among
the kings equal in rank with the Hittite great king, has been
erased. 203 Evidently, the king of A®®iyawa was downgraded
in the eyes of the Hittites as compared to the situation
at the time of Muwatallis II. To this comes that the
ban on traffic of A®®iyawa as referred to in the Sausgamuwa-treaty
may have become more serious in the course
of time. Tud®aliyas IV had a program of incorporating all
of southwest Anatolia into his realm: early in his reign he
announced the plan to conquer the territory west of Par®a
along the Kastaraya (= Perge along the Kestros in Pamphylia)
and to add the newly won territory to the province
of Tar®untassa (= Cilicia Aspera). 204 At a later stage in his
reign, he conquered the region of the lower Xanthos valley
in Lycia – a country where no one of his ancestors had
ever marched. 205 The rationale behind this scheme is to
clear the sea from pirates – the Lycians were notorious for
this activity already in the time of the El-Amarna archive
in the 14th century BC – as a preparation for his ultimate
goal: the conquest of Alasiya (= Cyprus). In the final years
of his reign, then, he ultimately launched a campaign
against the island of Alasiya, but a definite result was
reached only by his son and successor, Suppiluliumas II
(1205-1180? BC), who also set up a memorial for this
201 Bryce 1998: 339-42 (Milawata-letter).
202 Niemeier 1998b: 153.
203 Bryce 1998: 342-4.
204 Otten 1988: VIII, 62-4 and commentary.
205 Poetto 1993; Woudhuizen 1994-5: 168-179; Woudhuizen
2004a: section 3 ; see section 6 above.