Treaty between Šuppiluliuma I and Šattiwaza of Mitanni

TNMM 2589

The Treaty of Šuppiluliuma I and Šattiwaza is a diplomatic agreement concluded between the Hittite king Šuppiluliuma I and the Mitannian ruler Šattiwaza during the mid-fourteenth century BCE, probably between 1370 and 1350 BCE. The text, written in Akkadian and preserved on several cuneiform tablets from the royal archives of Ḫattuša, records the conditions imposed upon Mitanni following Hittite intervention in a dynastic succession dispute. Although fundamentally a political document, it is of exceptional importance for the history of religion because it contains the earliest known textual attestation of the divine name Mitra.

As part of the oath section of the treaty, a long list of divine witnesses is invoked to guarantee the agreement. Among numerous Hittite, Hurrian and Mesopotamian deities appear the names Mitra, Varuna, Indra and the Nāsatyas, divinities later well known from the Vedic tradition. Their inclusion is generally interpreted as reflecting the presence and influence of an Indo-Aryan military aristocracy, the maryannu, within the kingdom of Mitanni. While the document provides little information about the nature of their worship, it demonstrates that these gods enjoyed sufficient prestige to be called upon as guarantors of an international treaty.

For the study of Mitra, the treaty represents a milestone. Although it does not document a developed cult and should not be regarded as evidence for the later Roman mysteries of Mithras, it constitutes the earliest surviving textual reference to a deity bearing the name Mitra and provides valuable evidence for the antiquity and geographical diffusion of Indo-Iranian religious traditions. The association of Mitra with the protection of agreements and sworn obligations, a characteristic that would remain central to the god’s identity in later Iranian traditions, is already implicit in his role as a divine witness to the treaty.

The tablets were discovered in 1907 during excavations at Ḫattuša, the Hittite capital, near modern Boğazkale in central Turkey. The treaty survives in several copies and fragments originating from the royal archives. Some of the principal tablets are preserved in Turkish collections, while at least one fragment, BM 108609 (1913,1011.62), is held by the British Museum in London.