An archaeological discovery related to the ancient Hittite civilisation made in early 20th century sheds "new light on the Bible as a historical document," the Sunday Express reports citing Tom Meyer, a professor of Bible studies at Shasta Bible College.
According to the newspaper, the discovery in question helped confirm the very existence of the Hittite civilisation which, despite being mentioned numerous times in the Old Testament, had a rather "unsubstantial archaeological record."
"That all changed in the early 1900s when German archaeologist and linguist Hugo Winckler got wind of ancient clay tablets discovered by local looters in a small modern-day town in Turkey known as Bogazkale," Meyer explained.
A series of excavations at Bogazkale, organised by Winckler between 1906 and 1912, yielded a veritable bonanza of finds, including a fortified tower, five temples, a number of sculptures and a trove of some 10,000 ancient clay tablets.
"The eventual decipherment of some of the tablets in 1915 by Bedrich Hrozny, a Czech professor at the University of Vienna, led to the determination that modern-day Bogazkale was once the ancient capital city of the Hittite empire, known throughout history as Hattusha," Meyer notes.
And as the tablets essentially "revealed a chronology of the Hittites' history in the 14th to 13th centuries BC," as the newspaper puts it, the professor argued that this find also affects the perception of the Bible.
"The rediscovery of this lost civilisation and the revival of their language serves as a warning to those who doubt the historical accuracy of the Bible," Meyer adds. "Just because a discovery has not been made today doesn’t mean that it can’t be made tomorrow."
