Tarkasnawa

Tarkasnawa was ruler of the Kingdom of Mira, and one of the last independent kings of Arzawa, a Bronze Age confederation of kingdoms in western Anatolia. He was probably the son of King Alantalli, and a contemporary of the Hittite king Tudḫaliya IV.^[1] If, as proposed,^[2]^[3] Tarkasnawa was the recipient of the Milawata letter, he may have been subject to the Hittite king.^[4]

Tarkasnawa appears in the Karabel relief, where his name is inscribed in Luwian hieroglyphs. The inscription, next to the figure of the king, reads:

(King) Tarkasnawa, king of <the land> Mira,

[son] of BIRD-li(?), king of the land Mira, grandson
of [ ... ], king of the land Mir.^[1]

He is also known from various seals, one of them in which his name was formerly read "Tarkondemos".^[1] This is a bilingual seal, combining a cuneiform inscription on the rim and the corresponding Hittite hieroglyphs around the figure in royal dress, giving the name of the ruler: Tarkasnawa.^[1] This bilingual inscription provided the first clues for deciphering Hittite hieroglyphs.

Seal of Tarkasnawas, also known as the "Tarkondemos seal", with the cuneiform inscription "tar-kaš-ša-na-wa"^[1]
Seal of Tarkasnawa (drawing of imprint)
Seal of Tarkasnawa: 19th-century reading of the cuneiform
Name of Tarkasnawa in Luwian hieroglyphs on the Karabel relief^[5]

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Hawkins, J. D. (1998). "Tarkasnawa King of Mira 'Tarkondemos', Boǧazköy Sealings and Karabel". Anatolian Studies. 48: 1–31. doi:10.2307/3643046. ISSN 0066-1546. JSTOR 3643046. S2CID 178771977.
^ Beckman, Gary; Bryce, Trevor; Cline, Eric (2011). The Ahhiyawa Texts (PDF). Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. p. 131. ISBN 978-1-58983-268-8. Retrieved 15 May 2025. The name of neither the author of the document nor its recipient appears in the surviving parts of the text. But there is general agreement that the former was Tudhaliya IV, and among the various candidates suggested for the latter, the most likely is Tarkasnawa, ruler of the Arzawan kingdom called Mira.
^ Hawkins, J. David (2009). "The Arzawa letters in recent perspective". British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan. 14: 80.
^ Beckman, Gary; Bryce, Trevor; Cline, Eric (2011). The Ahhiyawa Texts (PDF). Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. pp. 131–2. ISBN 978-1-58983-268-8. Retrieved 15 May 2025. Tudhaliya seems to have formed a kind of partnership with Tarkasnawa, in which the latter assumed the role of a regional overlord, with immediate authority over a number of Hittite vassal territories in the west, while still remaining a subject of and directly answerable to the Hittite king. Such an arrangement would have been unprecedented in the imperial organization of the Hittite world, and may well have been prompted by the Hittites' increasing difficulties in maintaining their authority unilaterally throughout their western territories.
^ Wright, William (1886). The Empire of the Hittites : with Decipherment of Hittite inscriptions. London : Nisbet.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)

[JDH-1] Hawkins, J. D. (1998). "Tarkasnawa King of Mira 'Tarkondemos', Boǧazköy Sealings and Karabel". Anatolian Studies. 48: 1–31. doi:10.2307/3643046. ISSN 0066-1546. JSTOR 3643046. S2CID 178771977.

[2] Beckman, Gary; Bryce, Trevor; Cline, Eric (2011). The Ahhiyawa Texts (PDF). Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. p. 131. ISBN 978-1-58983-268-8. Retrieved 15 May 2025. The name of neither the author of the document nor its recipient appears in the surviving parts of the text. But there is general agreement that the former was Tudhaliya IV, and among the various candidates suggested for the latter, the most likely is Tarkasnawa, ruler of the Arzawan kingdom called Mira.

[3] Hawkins, J. David (2009). "The Arzawa letters in recent perspective". British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan. 14: 80.

[4] Beckman, Gary; Bryce, Trevor; Cline, Eric (2011). The Ahhiyawa Texts (PDF). Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. pp. 131–2. ISBN 978-1-58983-268-8. Retrieved 15 May 2025. Tudhaliya seems to have formed a kind of partnership with Tarkasnawa, in which the latter assumed the role of a regional overlord, with immediate authority over a number of Hittite vassal territories in the west, while still remaining a subject of and directly answerable to the Hittite king. Such an arrangement would have been unprecedented in the imperial organization of the Hittite world, and may well have been prompted by the Hittites' increasing difficulties in maintaining their authority unilaterally throughout their western territories.

[5] Wright, William (1886). The Empire of the Hittites : with Decipherment of Hittite inscriptions. London : Nisbet.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]