Hattic

Part of speech: adjective, noun

Definitions

1. Relating to the Hattians, an ancient people of central Anatolia, or to their non-Indo-European language
2. Describing the ancient inhabitants of Hatti in Anatolia and the language they spoke before the Hittite period
3. Of or belonging to the early Bronze Age people of central Anatolia known as the Hattians and their tongue

Etymology: The word "Hattic" describes the Hattians, the non-Indo-European people who inhabited central Anatolia (modern Turkey) long before the Hittites arrived, and their language. Its shape is simple: it is the name "Hatti" with the English adjective-forming suffix "-ic" added on, the same suffix that turns "Greek" into "Grecic" in older writing or "Semitic" from "Semite." The name it rests on, Hatti, is itself the name the Hittites gave to the people they found already living in the region, and the Hittites later applied it to their own kingdom as well. Because the people spoke a language unrelated to Hittite or any other known family, scholars call it an isolate, and "Hattic" is the standard term for that language in English scholarship. The adjective is therefore used in two ways: for the people's culture and for the language itself, which survives only in ritual texts copied by Hittite scribes.