Höyük / trade colony
First settlements · Kayseri

Kültepe (Kanesh)

UNESCO Tentative ListBronze Age (Assyrian colony)19 km from Kayseri

Kanesh, where Assyrian merchants traded tin and textiles around 1900 BC and left tens of thousands of letters and contracts, the oldest written documents in Anatolia.

Plan the visitIts place in history

Plan your visit

Time to allow
About 1–2 hours

For a first visit at an easy pace.

Stay in
Kayseri

19 km away as the crow flies, so allow more on the road.

On a trip
The Hittite heartland

Day 3 of 3.

Hours and tickets
Check before you go

Opening hours and prices change: see muze.gov.tr (opens in a new tab).

Times are our estimates. Distances are straight lines.

Its place in history

Read the chapter before you go.

1650–1180 BCHittitesBefore the Hittites, Assyrian merchants traded tin and cloth at Kanesh and kept their letters on clay.

Where its treasures are now

In Türkiye

Kültepe (Kanesh) merchant tablets

c. 1950–1750 BC. Letters and contracts of Assyrian traders at Kanesh, the oldest written documents in Anatolia; on UNESCO's Memory of the World register since 2015.

Museum of Anatolian Civilizations, Ankara
first

First writing in Anatolia, and the oldest Indo-European words. Kültepe (Kanesh) merchant tablets, c. 1950–1750 BC. Confirmed How sure we are →

first

Oldest known marriage contract with an infertility and surrogacy clause. Kültepe marriage contract of Laqipum and Hatala, c. 1900 BC. Confirmed How sure we are →

From here

Kayseri

Open in OpenStreetMap (opens in a new tab) · Directions to Kültepe (opens in a new tab)

Also nearby

  • 20 km
    Caesarea (Kayseri)

    City, Roman–Seljuk

  • museum
    Kayseri Archaeology Museum

    Kültepe/Kanesh tablets

Location precise · Source (opens in a new tab)