FRAGMENT FROM THE WORLD'S OLDEST PEACE TREATY FOUND

• A 3,200-year-old cuneiform clay tablet found at the Hattusha archaeological site in Çorum has been identified as belonging to one of the copies of the Kadesh Treaty, the world's oldest known peace treaty. Thanks to the discovery announced by the Minister of Culture and Tourism, Mehmet Nuri Ersoy, on September 21, World Peace Day, a new piece has been added to the traces of the treaty in Hattusha.

Detailed scientific studies were conducted for approximately a year on a preserved cuneiform inscription found near building "E" in Büyükkale. The studies determined that the fragment belongs to one of the copies of the Kadesh Peace Treaty between the Hittite King Hattusili III and the Egyptian King Ramses II. The new find contains lines from articles 12-20 of the treaty, which regulate the treatment of people fleeing their countries and seeking refuge in the other country. The legible parts of the text, which has broken and missing sections, mention people fleeing from Egypt and Hatti, and also include statements regarding the non-destruction of houses.

The Egyptian text of the Kadesh Peace Treaty was inscribed in hieroglyphs on the temple walls in Egypt. Fragments of the Akkadian text, however, were unearthed during the first phase of excavations in Hattusa between 1906 and 1912. Previously discovered fragments are now in the collections of the Istanbul Archaeological Museums, the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations, the Berlin Near Eastern Museum, and the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg. This new discovery contributes to the work of completing the Hattusa clay tablet copies of the treaty. The ongoing excavations in Büyükkale aim to find the remaining missing fragments of the treaty.