Between core and periphery: Archaeology of sovereignty of the Land of Tuwanuwa at the time of the Hittite Great Power

This paper presents an overview of the political orientation of the Land of Tuwanuwa (modern southern Cappadocia) during the Late Bronze Age. New results from archaeological activities in the region over the last 15 years are here summarized in a coherent picture, with an emphasis on how such results push for a change in the role of this region between ca. 1600-1200 BC. While the region south of the Kızıl Irmak has been portrayed in Hittite geography as the region most directly integrated into the Hittite territorial administration, it is now suggested that this region, outside the Lower Land Province, was not strategically central to the control of traffic through the Taurus Mountains and was only partially under direct Hittite control.