Setting the stage for Hittite Studies in Victorian England: practices and methods of the 1870s

The 1870s mark the beginning in England of studies of the monuments of Syria and Anatolia with inscriptions in what is now called Luwian or Anatolian Hieroglyphic. Here we see the first attempts at deciphering the inscriptions, involving among others G. Smith and A.H. Sayce. Furthermore, W. Wright and A.H. Sayce attribute the monuments to the Hittites. The debate develops within learned societies, the British Museum and various clubs, in a mixture of cooperation and rivalry between individual scholars. This article offers an overview of research currently under way based on unpublished archival documents preserved in London, Cambridge and Oxford.