Hittite life revived after 3,500 years in Turkish village

ÇORUM

A project to revive a Hittite village has been completed in the Boğazkale district of the Central Anatolian province of Çorum and is ready to display the former glory of one of the largest empires of the world that existed 3,500 years ago.

Located in Hattusa, the capital of the Hittites, which was included in the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1986 and whose cuneiform tablet archives were included in the UNESCO World Memory List in 2001, the village has a production workshop and an art workshop operated by the Women’s Entrepreneurial Cooperative, as well as elements that reflect that period. The village is set to present the conditions of that ancient period.

While 1.4 million Turkish Liras have been spent on the construction of Hittite Village, which was established with the support of the Special Provincial Administration and the Central Black Sea Development Agency (OKA), the project was completed and put into service for Çorum’s tourism after an environmental arrangement.

The village is among the places worth seeing with its six-kilometer walls, monumental gates surrounding the ancient city, the 71-meter-long underground passage, the palace in Büyükkale, 31 temples that have been unearthed so far, the huge silos on the back of Büyükkaya in the northeast of the city and the Yazılıkaya Open Air Temple.

Built in Hattusa, it will contribute to the promotion of the Hittites and to increase the number of tourists coming to region.
In a recent visit to the village, Çorum Governor Mustafa Çiftçi said that they had completed the project that started in 2016.

Stating that the project consists of Hittite village as well as the garden and landscape arrangement in which the village is located.

“During my visit last year, I saw that the garden was in bad shape. This year, landscape and environmental arrangement were completed. Landscaping had a cost of 1 million liras,” he said.

Emphasizing that a beautiful project has emerged in Hattusha, Çiftçi said, “This place will become a living Hittite village as it retains its essential identity. We have a production workshop operated by the Women’s Enterprise Cooperative in our village. Our women produce and sell their handmade products here. We have an art workshop. The Public Education Center will open a workshop. This place will become even more beautiful when the other sections open.”