Preface

Since the Neolithic period, Anatolia, situated on the threshold of the Taş Tepeler (Stone Hills) such as Göbeklitepe, Karahantepe, and Çakmaktepe, and serving as a locus of human (Lat. homo sapiens) settlement, the being also described as homo loquens (Eng. “the speaking animal”), can be characterized as a “pantheon of languages” (Akkuş, 2025, p. 361) This characterization stems from its geography: bordered on the one hand by the Caucasus, described by the Arab historian-geographer al-Masʿūdī as the “Mountain of Languages,” and on the other by the “Fertile Crescent,” where Sumerian, the first language to be committed to writing, was spoken. In this geography, some of the earliest Indo-European languages, such as the Hittite language, as well as Hurrian, were spoken, and thousands of documents belonging to these languages have been unearthed through archaeological excavations.

Since the Neolithic period, Anatolia, situated on the threshold of the Taş Tepeler (Stone Hills) such as Göbeklitepe, Karahantepe, and Çakmaktepe, and serving as a locus of human (Lat. homo sapiens) settlement, the being also described as homo loquens (Eng. “the speaking animal”), can be characterized as a “pantheon of languages” (Akkuş, 2025, p. 361) This characterization stems from its geography: bordered on the one hand by the Caucasus, described by the Arab historian-geographer al-Masʿūdī as the “Mountain of Languages,” and on the other by the “Fertile Crescent,” where Sumerian, the first language to be committed to writing, was spoken. In this geography, some of the earliest Indo-European languages, such as the Hittite language, as well as Hurrian, were spoken, and thousands of documents belonging to these languages have been unearthed through archaeological excavations.