How did Hittite tablets reach us across millennia? Read about the meaning of recording, and the psychological benefits of journaling and family memory.
Imagine finding an old letter forgotten in a drawer. You recognise the handwriting; perhaps your grandmother's hand, perhaps that of a friend from your youth. After reading a few lines, a day from years ago, a voice, a feeling comes back. The land of Çorum is a place where this experience happens on a far larger scale. Hittite tablets carry into the present laws, letters, prayers and treaties that were inscribed in clay more than three thousand years ago. In this article we treat the tablets as the memory of a city and use them to look at our own personal and family memory: why do we record things, how do forgetting and remembering affect our mental health, and how can writing help us organise our thoughts and feelings?
Hittite Tablets: The Memory of a City in Figures
The cuneiform tablets found at Boğazköy, the site of the Hittite capital Hattusa, are on UNESCO's Memory of the World register. Most records give the date of inscription as 2001; some sources give 2002. According to UNESCO, this archive contains around 25,000 tablets; some sources put the number at "more than 30,000". Whatever the exact figure, it is one of the largest written archives of the ancient world.
Boğazköy is not the only archive in Çorum. In excavations that began in 1990 at Şapinuva in the Ortaköy district, around 4,000 tablets and fragments have been found; one source gives this number as around 5,000. Since 2019 the excavations have been carried out on behalf of Hitit University under the direction of Prof. Dr. Aygül Süel.
The archive is still growing. In September 2026 it was announced that a fragment of a new Akkadian copy of the Treaty of Kadesh had been found in the Büyükkale area of Hattusa. The legible lines were reported to include clauses such as the mutual return of fugitives and the non-destruction of homes. Another copy of the treaty, found at Boğazköy in 1906, is held at the Istanbul Archaeology Museums.
One of the clauses in this new fragment is also thought-provoking from a psychological point of view: that homes should not be destroyed. A home is not just a shelter; it is a place of memory where recollections, belongings and family stories accumulate. This is why people who lose their homes through migration, earthquakes or moving often feel they have lost not just a building but a fabric of memory. The fact that a clause saying "homes shall not be destroyed" was written into a treaty thousands of years ago reminds us how old the meaning of home is for human beings.
These figures have their limits too. A significant proportion of the tablets are broken or incomplete; what each fragment tells us can only be worked out through long and meticulous study. In addition, the tablets do not represent every part of society equally: the great majority concern the affairs of the palace, the temples and the state. The everyday lives, feelings and stories of ordinary people find much less room in this archive.
Still, there is one truth the tablets remind us of: what is recorded remains. What is not recorded is often lost over time.
The Sociology of Record-Keeping: Why Do Societies Write?
Societies need to keep records for different reasons. These reasons should be thought of as possible functions rather than definite explanations.
Order and trust. When laws, treaties and contracts are written down, people know what applies. A written record is a safeguard against words being forgotten or distorted.
Continuity. A king dies, a ruler changes; but the written archive remains. This allows a society to maintain its bond with its own past.
Identity. When a community answers the question "Who are we?", it often looks to its past. Archives are the places where the answers to this question are kept.
Changing ways of recording. Today the ways we record things have changed radically. Our phones hold thousands of photos, messages and videos; but most of them are scattered, disorganised and easily lost. As family albums and letters have declined, family memory has also been scattered across screens and cloud accounts.
Migration and disconnection. For families who have migrated from Çorum to big cities or abroad, the belongings, photographs and stories left behind in the village or the old house can become inaccessible over time. When elders pass away, a whole web of stories can be lost with them.
Earthquakes and disasters. The earthquakes of 6 February 2023 painfully showed that many families can lose their photographs, documents and keepsakes all at once. This experience also underlined the importance of keeping family memory not in just one place, but in different forms and in different places.
These factors show that recording things is meaningful not only for states but also for families and individuals.
Memory and Identity: Writing Our Own Story
In psychology, memory is not seen simply as a place where information is stored; it is also a process that builds our identity. Our answer to the question "Who am I?" is made up largely of what we remember and how we tell it. In psychology this is explained through the concepts of autobiographical memory and narrative identity: people organise their lives like a story, and this story shapes how they see themselves.
This story is not fixed. We can tell the same event in different ways at different times. For example, years later we might describe losing a job not as "the worst period of my life" but as "a turning point that set me in a new direction". Retelling in this way does not change the past; but it can change our relationship with it.
Memory is not an archive that preserves the past exactly as it was; it is a tablet we rewrite each time we remember.
Forgetting has a function too. It is neither possible nor necessary to remember every detail. However, some memories, especially painful ones, can neither be forgotten nor made part of a coherent story. In that case the mind may keep circling around them. For someone who has lost a loved one, remembering can be both painful and comforting; we look at this aspect of grief in more detail in our article on the grieving process.
Another way of remembering the past is nostalgia. Longing for the old days, though it may sometimes bring sadness, can often strengthen a sense of connection and continuity. We look at this topic separately in our article on nostalgia and missing old Çorum.
The Psychological Benefits of Writing: Journals, Letters and Life Stories
The Hittites inscribed their knowledge in clay; today we write in notebooks, on phones or on computers. The tools may have changed, but what writing gives the human mind may be similar.
Regulating emotions. Studies of "expressive writing", examined in psychology for a long time, show that putting thoughts and feelings about difficult experiences into writing can contribute to wellbeing in some people. The effect is not the same for everyone and writing does not replace treatment; but putting an experience that sits scattered in the mind into words can make it more understandable.
Breaking the cycle. The same thought going round and round in the mind, that is, overthinking, is an experience many people recognise. Writing the thought on paper can make it easier to see it from the outside and to ask, "How realistic is this thought?" We look at this topic in more detail in our article on overthinking.
Noticing patterns. A journal kept regularly can, over time, allow a person to see fluctuations in their mood, their triggers and the ways of coping that work for them.
Writing letters. Writing a letter, even one that will never be sent, can be a way of voicing words that could not be said. A letter written to a loved one who has died, to a sibling you are no longer speaking to, or to your past self can help feelings find expression.
Life story work. Particularly in later life, reviewing one's life and recording important moments, achievements and difficulties in writing or on audio can help a person look at their life as a whole. Work of this kind is among the approaches used to support a sense of meaning in older age.
Let's say a retired teacher begins telling the story of the family's past for a grandchild's homework. As he talks, he remembers his own youth, coming from the village to the city, his first year as a teacher. His grandchild takes notes; a few weeks later a small family notebook has taken shape. For the first time in months, the teacher feels like "someone who is leaving something behind". The grandchild, for their part, sees their grandfather for the first time as "the hero of a story".
Lasting Traces Like Hittite Tablets: Suggestions for Recording Family Memory
Hittite tablets show us that what is recorded can reach across generations. To preserve your own family memory and benefit from the healing side of writing, you might consider the following steps:
- Start with a short journal. You don't have to write at length every day. Three sentences at the end of the day are enough: What happened, how did I feel, what do I need?
- Record your elders' stories. Making an audio recording or taking notes while talking with your grandparents preserves stories that could otherwise be lost. Questions such as "What did you love most when you were young?" or "What was Çorum like in the old days?" are a good start.
- Organise your photographs. Choosing photos from your phone or old albums and putting together a family album with short notes brings scattered memory together.
- Write letters you won't send. Expressing in a letter what you have not been able to say can help you regulate your emotions.
- Involve the children. Drawing a family tree or telling the stories behind old belongings can help children take ownership of both family memory and the habit of writing.
- Don't judge what you write. A journal is not a work of literature. Spelling mistakes, untidy sentences or contradictory feelings are completely natural.
- Take care with privacy. Decide where and how you will keep your personal writing. Feeling safe allows you to write more openly.
One more thing should be said: while writing is soothing for some people, for others it can bring painful memories back to life. If you feel intense distress while writing, it is important to take a break and be kind to yourself.
When Should You Seek Professional Support?
Thinking about the past, remembering and sometimes feeling sad are part of being human. However, in the following situations it may be helpful to talk to a professional:
- If certain memories come to mind involuntarily and often, making daily life difficult
- If intense guilt, shame or anger about past events has lasted a long time
- If the same thoughts going round in your mind are noticeably affecting your sleep and concentration
- If, months after a loss, you are still struggling to return to daily life
- If forgetfulness, confusion or memory problems are noticeably increasing
The last point may also require a neurological assessment; it is therefore important to see a doctor. These signs do not on their own mean a diagnosis. However, if the thoughts circling in your mind have turned into anxiety, you can find more information on our anxiety and panic page.
How Are Writing and Life Story Work Used in Therapy?
In therapy, writing is often used as a tool that helps a person observe themselves between sessions and consolidate what they have learned.
Within the framework of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), thought records play an important role. The person writes down a situation they found difficult, the thought that went through their mind at that moment, the emotion they felt and alternative perspectives on that thought. Over time, these records make it easier for the person to notice their own thinking patterns.
When working with grief, loss or difficult life experiences, letter writing and narrative work can also be used. Retelling one's own story can help a person re-evaluate the meaning of an experience. From a schema therapy perspective, writing about childhood memories can be a resource for understanding the roots of present-day emotional reactions.
Life story work with older clients can support a person in looking at their life as a whole, remembering what they have achieved and making peace with the difficulties they have lived through. This work is always carried out at the person's own pace and according to their wishes; no memory is opened up by force. Sessions can take place in Çorum face to face or online.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where were the Hittite tablets found?
Most of the Hittite tablets were unearthed at Boğazköy, the site of the Hittite capital Hattusa; according to UNESCO, this archive contains around 25,000 tablets. There is also a second archive of around 4,000 tablets at Şapinuva in Çorum's Ortaköy district.
Does keeping a journal really help?
Research on expressive writing shows that putting thoughts and feelings into writing can contribute to wellbeing in some people. However, its effect varies from person to person and it does not replace professional support.
Writing makes me feel sadder. Should I stop?
Writing about difficult memories can bring temporary sadness; this is natural. However, if the distress is very intense or does not pass for a long time, it may be better to take a break and talk about these memories with a professional in a safe setting.
How can I record the stories of an older relative?
You can begin in a relaxed setting with specific questions: their childhood, their youth, their first job, their marriage. It is important to ask permission before making an audio recording or taking notes, and to respect subjects they do not wish to talk about.
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Eda Erkan Alapala
Klinik Psikolog. İstanbul Kent Üniversitesi Klinik Psikoloji Tezli Yüksek Lisans mezunu; bilişsel davranışçı terapi, çocuk merkezli oyun terapisi ve çocuk-ergen psikoterapisi alanlarında eğitimlerini tamamlamıştır.
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