Mursili II

Mursili II (also spelled Mursilis II) was a king of the Hittite Empire (New kingdom) ca. 1321–1295 BC (short chronology).^[1]

Family

Mursili was the third born son of King Suppiluliuma I, one of the most powerful men to rule over the Hittite Empire, and Queen Henti . He was the younger brother of Arnuwanda II, he also had a sister and one more brother.

Mursili is known to have had several children with his first wife Gassulawiya including three sons named Muwatalli, Hattusili III and Halpasulupi. A daughter named Massanauzzi (referred to as Matanaza in correspondence with the Egyptian king Ramesses II) was married to Masturi, a ruler of a vassal state. Mursili had further sons with a second wife named Tanuhepa. The names of the sons of this second wife have not been recorded however.^[2]

Through his son Muwatalli he had a grandson who also ruled the kingdom, Mursili III, Queen Maathorneferure and Tudhaliya IV were also grandchildren of Mursili II.

Hittite New Kingdom royal family tree

Himuili?^{[lower-alpha 1]}

Tudhaliya I/II^{[lower-alpha 2]}

Nikkalmati^{[lower-alpha 3]}

Arnuwanda I^{[lower-alpha 3]}

Asmunikal^{[lower-alpha 3]}

Hattusili II?^{[lower-alpha 4]}

Tudhaliya III^{[lower-alpha 5]}

Daduhepa^{[lower-alpha 6]}

Zida^{[lower-alpha 7]}

Tudhaliya the Young^{[lower-alpha 8]}

Henti^{[lower-alpha 7]} (1)

Suppiluliuma I^{[lower-alpha 8]}

(2) Tawananna^{[lower-alpha 9]}

Arnuwanda II^{[lower-alpha 7]}

Telipinu^{[lower-alpha 10]}

Sarri-Kusuh^{[lower-alpha 11]}^{[lower-alpha 12]}

Zannanza^{[lower-alpha 13]}

Gassulawiya^{[lower-alpha 14]} (1)

Mursili II^{[lower-alpha 7]}

(2) Tanuhepa^{[lower-alpha 15]}

Talmi-Sarruma^{[lower-alpha 16]}

Sahurunuwa^{[lower-alpha 11]}^{[lower-alpha 17]}

Muwatalli II^{[lower-alpha 15]}

Halpasulupi^{[lower-alpha 18]}

Massanauzzi^{[lower-alpha 19]}

Hattusili III^{[lower-alpha 20]}

Puduhepa^{[lower-alpha 21]}

Ini-Tesub^{[lower-alpha 11]}^{[lower-alpha 22]}

Urhi-Tesub^{[lower-alpha 15]}

Kurunta^{[lower-alpha 23]}

Nerikkaili^{[lower-alpha 24]}

numerous daughters^{[lower-alpha 25]} and sons^{[lower-alpha 26]}

Tudhaliya IV^{[lower-alpha 27]}

Talmi-Tesub^{[lower-alpha 11]}^{[lower-alpha 28]}

Hartapu^{[lower-alpha 29]}

Arnuwanda III^{[lower-alpha 30]}

Suppiluliuma II^{[lower-alpha 30]}^{[lower-alpha 31]}

Kuzi-Tesub^{[lower-alpha 32]}

(1) = 1st spouse
(2) = 2nd spouse
Small caps indicates a Great King (LUGAL.GAL) of the Land of Hatti; italic small caps indicates a Great Queen or Tawananna.
Dashed lines indicate adoption.
Solid lines indicate marriage (if horizontal) or parentage (if vertical).

References:

Trevor Bryce (1997). The Kingdom of the Hittites. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press.
Trevor Bryce (2012). The World of the Neo-Hittite Kingdoms. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
Volkert Haas (2006). Die hethitische Literatur. Berlin, Germany: de Gruyter.

Notes:

↑ Scholars have suggested that Tudhaliya I/II was the son of Himuili and thus a grandson of the Hittite king Huzziya II (Bryce 1997, p. 131).
↑ Bryce (1997) does not consider it clear whether Tudhaliya I/II was one king or two (p. 133).
1 2 3 Bryce (1997), p. 139.
↑ The existence of Hattusili II is doubtful (Bryce 1997, pp. 153–154).
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 158.
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 172.
1 2 3 4 Bryce (1997), p. 174.
1 2 Bryce (1997), p. 168.
↑ Also known as Malnigal; daughter of Burnaburias II of Babylonia (Bryce 1997, p. 173).
↑ ‘Great priest’ in Kizzuwadna and king (lugal) of Aleppo (Bryce 1997, p. 174).
1 2 3 4 King (lugal) of Carchemish.
↑ Bryce (1997), pp. 174, 203–204.
↑ Zannanza died on his way to Egypt to marry a pharaoh's widow, probably Ankhesenpaaten, the widow of Tutankhamun (Bryce 1997, pp. 196–198).
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 227.
1 2 3 Bryce (1997), p. 230.
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 220.
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 222.
↑ Haas (2006), p. 91.
↑ Massanauzzi married Masturi, king of the Seha River Land (Bryce 1997, p. 313).
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 296.
↑ Puduhepa was the daughter of the Kizzuwadnan priest Pentipsarri (Bryce 1997, p. 273).
↑ Bryce (1997), pp. 346, 363.
↑ King (lugal) of Tarhuntassa (Bryce 1997, p. 296); apparently later Great King of Hatti (Bryce 1997, p. 354).
↑ Nerikkaili married a daughter of Bentesina, king of Amurru (Bryce 1997, p. 294).
↑ Two daughters of Hattusili III were married to the pharaoh Ramesses II; one was given the Egyptian name Ma(hor)nefrure. Another, Gassuwaliya, married into the royal house of Amurru. Kilushepa was married to a king of Isuwa. A daughter married into the royal family of Babylon. A sister of Tudhaliya IV married Sausgamuwa, king of Amurru after his father Bentesina. From Bryce (1997), pp. 294 and 312.
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 332.
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 363. Tudhaliya IV probably married a Babylonian princess, known by her title of Great Princess (dumu.sal gal) (Bryce 1997, pp. 294, 331).
↑ Bryce (1997), p. 363.
↑ Great King of Tarhuntassa; son of Mursili, the Great King, who is likely identical with Mursili III/Urhi-Tesub (Bryce 2012, p. 21 f.).
1 2 Bryce (1997), p. 361.
↑ Last documented Great King of the Land of Hatti.
↑ King and then Great King of Carchemish (Bryce 1997, pp. 384–385).

King of the Hittites

Hittite empire during the reign of Mursili.

Mursili assumed the Hittite throne after the premature death of Arnuwanda II who, like their father, fell victim to the plague which ravaged the Hatti in the 1320s BC. He was greeted with contempt by Hatti's enemies and faced numerous rebellions early in his reign, the most serious of which were those initiated by the Kaskas in the mountains of Anatolia, but also by the Arzawa kingdom in southwest Turkey because he was perceived to be an inexperienced ruler who only became king due to the early death of Arnuwanda. Mursili records the scorn of his foes in his Annals:

“

You are a child; you know nothing and instill no fear in me. Your land is now in ruins, and your infantry and chariotry are few. Against your infantry, I have many infantry; against your chariotry I have many chariotry. Your father had many infantry and chariotry. But you who are a child, how can you match him? (Comprehensive Annals, AM 18-21)^[3]

”

While Mursili was a young and inexperienced king, he was almost certainly not a child when he took the Hittite throne and must have reached an age to be capable of ruling in his own right.^[3] Had he been a child, other arrangements would have been made to secure the stability of the Empire; Mursili after all had two surviving elder brothers who served as the viceroys of Carchemish (i.e.: Sarri-Kush) and Aleppo respectively.^[3]

Mursili II would prove to be more than a match for his successful father, in his military deeds and diplomacy. The Annals for the first ten years of his reign have survived and record that he carried out punitive campaigns against the Kaska tribes in the first two years of his reign in order to secure his kingdom's northern borders. The king then turned to the West to resist the aggression of Uhhaziti, king of Arzawa, who was attempting to lure away Hittite allies into his camp. The Annals also reveal that an "omen of the sun," or solar eclipse, occurred in his tenth year as king, just as he was about to launch his campaign against the Kaska peoples.

While Mursili II's highest confirmed date was his twenty-second year,^[4] he is believed to have lived beyond this date for a few more years and died after a reign of around 25 to 27 years. He was succeeded by his son Muwatalli II.

The eclipse

Main article: Mursili's eclipse

Mursili's Year 10 solar eclipse is of great importance for the dating of the Hittite Empire within the chronology of the Ancient Near East. There are only two possible dates for the eclipse: 24 June 1312 BC or 13 April 1308 BC. The earlier date is accepted by Hittitologists such as Trevor R. Bryce (1998), while Paul Åström (1993) has suggested the later date. However, most scholars accept the 1312 BC event because this eclipse's effects would have been particularly dramatic with a near total eclipse over the Peloponese region and Anatolia (where Mursili II was campaigning) around noon. In contrast, the 1308 BC astronomical event began in Arabia and then travelled eastwards in a northeasterly direction; it only reached its maximum impact over Mongolia and Central Asia. It occurred over Anatolia around 8:20 in the morning making it less noticeable.^[5]

In fiction

Mursilis appears as a significant figure in the first two novels of Philip Armstrong's series The Chronicles of Tupiluliuma. He is Tupilu's uncle, who took him into his own family when he was orphaned, and is portrayed as a thoughtful, sympathetic man. In The Shadow Prince,^[6] he is haunted by guilt at his father's apparent usurpation of the throne and comes to believe that only his own self-sacrifice will abate the gods' anger and end the plague known as the White Death; he is dissuaded from this action by Ra'an, who explains the true circumstances of his father, Suppiluliumas, coming to the throne. He is also revealed to be, unwittingly, the biological father of the Amazon princess, Birrula. In the second book, The Isles of Winter: Ra'an's People,^[7] he suffers a stroke and is nursed back to health by Kantiya, daughter of the royal physician.
Janet Morris wrote a detailed biographical novel, I, the Sun, whose subject was Suppiluliuma I. Mursili II is an important figure in this novel, in which all characters are from the historical record, which Dr. Jerry Pournelle called "a masterpiece of historical fiction" and about which O.M. Gurney, Hittite scholar and author of The Hittites,^[8] commented that "the author is familiar with every aspect of Hittite culture".^[9] Morris' book was republished by The Perseid Press in April 2013.
Chie Shinohara wrote the manga series Red River (also known as Anatolia Story), about a fifteen-year-old Japanese girl named Yuri Suzuki, who is magically transported to Hattusa, the capital of the Hittite Empire in Anatolia. She was summoned by Queen Nakia who means to use Yuri as a human sacrifice. Yuri's blood is the key element needed in placing a curse upon the princes of the land so that they will perish, leaving Nakia's son as the sole heir to the throne. As the story progresses, however, Yuri not only repeatedly manages to escape Nakia's scheming, she also becomes revered as an incarnation of the goddess Ishtar and falls in love with prince Kail. Mursili II is portrayed as Prince Kail.

References

↑ Bryce, Trevor (1998). The Kingdom of the Hittites. Oxford University Press. ISBN 84-376-1918-1. p.xiii
↑ Trevor Bryce, How Old Was Matanazi?, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 84, (1998), pp. 212-215
1 2 3 Bryce, p.208
↑ Bryce, p.234
↑
↑ ISBN 1533673500
↑ ISBN 1535007192
↑ The Hittites, O.M. Gurney, Penguin, 1952
↑ I, the Sun, Janet Morris, Dell, 1983

Sources

Astrom, Paul, 'The Omen of the Sun in the Tenth Year of the Reign of Mursilis II', in Horizons and Styles: Studies in Early Art and Archaeology in Honour of Professor Homer L. Thomas (1993)
Bryce, Trevor, The Kingdom of the Hittites. Oxford University Press, 2005. ISBN 978-0-19-924010-4
Bryce, Trevor, Life and society in the Hittite world. Oxford University Press, 2002. ISBN 0-19-924170-8

External links

Reign of Mursili II

Regnal titles
Preceded by Arnuwanda II	Hittite king ca. 1321–1295 BC	Succeeded by Muwatalli II

Hittite kings

Hattic kings

c. 23rd–18th centuries BC	Pamba Pithana Piyusti Anitta Tudhaliya PU-Sarruma

Old Kingdom

c. 16th–15th centuries BC	Labarna I Hattusili I Mursili I Hantili I Zidanta I Ammuna Huzziya I Telipinu

Middle Kingdom

c. mid-to-late 15th century BC	Alluwamna Tahurwaili Hantili II Zidanta II Huzziya II Muwatalli I

New Kingdom

c. 14th–12th centuries BC	Tudhaliya I Arnuwanda I Hattusili II Tudhaliya II Tudhaliya III Suppiluliuma I Arnuwanda II Mursili II Muwatalli II Mursili III Hattusili III Tudhaliya IV Arnuwanda III Suppiluliuma II

Authority control	WorldCat Identities VIAF: 107441311 LCCN: no2010027595 GND: 118735357 SUDOC: 137081405

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