The Hurrian Queen, and the Rock Sanctuary at Yazilikaya

Hebat is the great mother-goddess and queen of the Hurrian pantheon, consort of the storm-god Teshub, and she entered Hittite state religion as the empire took on an increasingly Hurrian character, where she was identified with the older Sun-goddess of Arinna. Her most vivid monument is the open-air rock sanctuary of Yazilikaya outside the capital, where the two great processions of the gods, male deities from the left, female from the right, converge, and Hebat is carved meeting her husband at the centre, standing on a lion or panther, her son the young storm-god Sarruma behind her.

Queen Puduhepa, herself the daughter of a Hurrian priest, gave Hebat particular devotion, which shows how the goddess's rise tracked the political and cultural ascendancy of the Hurrian element in the empire. Hebat is, in effect, the imperial face of the Hittite queen of the gods: an Anatolian sovereign goddess wearing a Hurrian name.