Yalburt Hittite Monument

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This monument is located in a summer meadow named Yalburt about 23 km northwest of the town of Ilgın in the province of Konya. The site was coincidentaly discovered in 1970 when a bulldozer was cleaning a hillside. It has been excavated in early 1970s by Raci Temizer, the director of the Anatolian Civilizations Museum.

The rectangular shaped pool has a line of 20 stone blocks with a hieroglyphic Luwian inscription. The dimensions of the pool is about 13 meters by 8 meters. Three sides of the pool (South, West and North) have the rock blocks with the inscriptions. It is not clear whether the fourth, Eastern side ever had similar blocks. The name cartuche of King Tudhaliya IV with its winged sun is clearly visible in the first block of the script. Most of the blocks were found reused in secondary context in later era structures around the vicinity of the pool. Restored positions of the blocks do seem to be entirely correct and several blocks are apparently missing as well. As has been shown by Poetto and Hawkins, blocks 1, 16 and 10 are quite likely to be the first three blocks of the inscription but nothing is certain for the rest. The inscription introduces Tudhaliya (IV) and describes his campaign. The monument was possibly a pool or reservoir similar to other water monuments of the Hittites, such as Eflatunpınar.