*u̯Ett(i)-

The lexeme is attested 17 times in the HLuw. corpus, mostly in inscriptions from Tabal and Commagene, but it can also be found in Malatya and Tell Ahmar. Nearly all texts date to between the late 10^th and the late 8^th centuries BCE; only İSPEKÇÜR may have an earlier dating around 1200 BCE or a little later.

[AH.B.]

Besides the occurrences listed above, the lexeme can also be found five times as part of the epithet MONS.REX ‘mountain king’, possibly /watta-hantawattis/, which is commonly used with the deity name (DEUS)SARMA, i.e. Sarruma; cf. the discussion of the stem in the lemma /hantawatt(i)-/ ‘king’.The spelling of the epithet varies between a partly syllabic version such as 〈MONS.REX-wa/i-ti-i〉 in ANCOZ 1, §4 and the purely logographic renditions 〈(DEUS)MONS.REX〉 in PERSEPOLIS and 〈MONS.REX〉 in ANCOZ 9, §2, KULULU 8, l. 1 and MALATYA 7.

The attestation 〈MONS-ti-zi〉 from ŞIRZI, §3 is, against Hawkins 2000a:323 and Gérard 2006a:248, very probably not a nom. pl., but an acc. pl., the phrase translating as ‘May (the god) Runtiya of the Open Country erect mountains before the temple’, cf. the verb /aruwaru(wa)-⁽ⁱ⁾/ ‘to erect’.

In ANCOZ 5, §3, the reading 〈(MONS)wa/i-ti-na〉 follows Poetto 2010b:132.

The inclusion in the above table of 〈(DEUS)AVIS-ti-zi〉 from TELL AHMAR 6, §2 follows Goedegebuure forthcoming.

[AH.B.]

The meaning ‘mountain’ was first assigned by Bossert 1933b:19 and followed and expounded upon by Bossert 1954b:131, 134f. Its semantic interpretation was helped along by the consistent use of the logogram MONS (*207), which is quite pictographic. Later discoveries bore out the assigned meaning, thus e.g. HİSARCIK 1, §2: a-wa/i-mi MONS-ti-na ha+ra/i-ha+ra/i-na 9-ta (CAPRA)i+ra/i-wa/i-ti-i á-ha, approx. /a=wa=mu wattin harharin nuwatta irwadi aha/, meaning ‘I celebrated (lit. ‘made’) Mount Harhari with (a) gazelle(s) nine times’ (cf. Hawkins 2000a:483f.). See also Goedegebuure forthcoming for a new appraisal of the deified use of the word.

[AH.B.]

The noun is common gender and subject to i-mutation. Gérard 2006a:249 proposes an earlier a-stem adjective */watta/i-/ with a meaning such as ‘high, elevated’ vel sim., which would have been substantivized; cf. under Reconstruction.

[AH.B.]

The lexeme is broadly attested in both festivals and ritual texts from various traditions.

[E.R.]

Checked against the photographs in the Mainzer Fotoarchiv. – Reading at KBo 4.11 rev. 40 follows Goedegebuure 2010a:311. – Reading at KBo 7.68 iii 14 according to Starke 1985b:363.

[E.R.]

The semantic interpretation of CLuw. watt(i)- as ‘mountain’ goes back to Gérard 2006a:248-251, who builds on the equation of the Hieroglyphic Luwian logogram MONS with /watt(i)-/, proposed by Bossert and Hawkins (see under Lemma). The context of KBo 29.25 iii 10’ wa-at-ti i-ia-an-du “let them go to the mountain(s)” is certainly suggestive (differently Lorenz & Rieken 2007a:478, CLL:267f.) as is the interpretation of wattatra (two items under the statue of a mountain god in a so-called Bildbeschreibung) as ‘humps (i.e. hump-backed mountains)’, but the conclusive evidence from the Ištanuwa festival was recognized by Goedegebuure 2010a:311 after her new reading of wa-ad-da-⸢ti⸣-[i=t]-ta (see under Graphic Features). As she points out, the collocation waddati= … ḫuwalpanati at KBo 4.11 rev. 40f. corresponds mutatis mutandis to ḪUR.SAG^ḪI.A-inzi ḫuwalpa[…-z]i ‘hump-backed mountains (?)’ (KUB 35.108+, 21’; cf. Rieken & Sasseville 2019a:525f.) and leads to a coherent translation of the context: “Arrive down (here) from the hump-backed mountains!” (differently Lorenz & Rieken 2007a:478, CLL:267f.).

[E.R.]

The stem follows the paradigm of the nouns with i-mutation.

[E.R.]

1. watta(t)tar/n-

2. wattant(i)-

3. wattann(i)-

This lexeme is found in a new inscription from Limyra published by Christiansen 2012a.

[D.S.]

Although the fragmentary state of the inscription calls for caution, Christiansen 2012a:145 analyzes the sequence ]: ẽtiweti : as ẽti ‘in’ and weti (dat./loc. sg.), comparing phrases like ẽti sttali ‘in the stele’. She does not suggest any meaning for the word in question. From a broader perspective, Lycian wete/i- matches Luw. watt(i)- c. ‘mountain’. Translating Lyc. ẽti weti km͂mã[ta] as ‘as many as (are) in the mountain’ is tempting, but independent confirmation is lacking. Differently, Gehrisch 2018a:211 translates weti as a verbal form meaning ‘he brings’, although her comparison with Lyc. B uwe-^(ti), which she translates as ‘to bring’, cannot be upheld; see under lemma.

[D.S.]