Photographic Archive of the Survey of Hittite sites in Anatolia

Images largely created during John Garstang's 1907 survey of Hittite sites in Anatolia, including pictures of Hittite monuments, the local landscape and buildings, anthropological images of the local population and general images of the survey team. The collection also includes images created at a later date and lantern slide negatives which appear to have been removed from the lantern slide negative collection.

Through his friendship with orientalist Archibald Henry Sayce, John Garstang became interested in the archaeology of the Hittites, a Bronze Age people located in the region of Anatolia (now located in Turkey and Syria). He initially carried out an exploratory journey of the area in 1904 and chose a site near the village Boghaz-Keui (Boğazkale, Turkey, later discovered to be the site of the Hittite capital Hattusas) to excavate.

Garstang returned to the region in the Spring of 1907, with a team comprising Rev M Linton Smith, Horst Schliephack, (Garstang's photographer), and Arthur Wilkins. On arrival, Garstang discovered that his permit to excavate Boghaz-Keui had been transferred to German archaeologist, Hugo Winckler.

Garstang decided he would carry out another exploratory journey to identify another excavation site, using the equipment and the team he had brought with from Liverpool. Using local guides, the team travelled for almost 2 months between Angora (Ankara, Turkey) and Aintab (Gaziantep, Turkey), visiting as many sites possibly related to the Hittites. The journey was documented by Schliephack (and possibly Garstang) using photography and Linton Smith copied inscriptions they discovered. The team documented previously unknown Hittite sites as well as the people and the geography of the region.

On his return Garstang reported that the team had brought back over 600 images which were to become the basis of the Institute’s lantern slide collection. His research was also published in Land of the Hittites: an account of recent explorations and discoveries in Asia Minor, with descriptions of the Hittite monuments, (London, 1910).

The negatives have been arranged alphabetically by location. There are gaps in some series as it is clear negatives have been previously removed from the collection and not returned. These have been left as empty records in the case the original item is discovered at a later date. The descriptions generally used the name the survey team recorded for the site/place, though were know the current name has also been noted. Negatives formerly part of the Misc. Near Eastern Negatives Collection (formerly referenced MISC) which were from Garstang's survey were integrated into the collection in 2015.

Access to the original negatives is limited. Negatives can be damaged by excessive handling, therefore the physical copies can only be accessed by researcher with legitimate reasons to consult the original items. Severely damaged negatives have been removed from the collection and the originals can only be accessed in exceptional circumstances.

The majority of the negatives are in a good condition but there are some which are broken, previously damaged by light exposure, or the emulsion is flaking. Some of the glass plate negatives have also been doctored presumably to make the image more suitable for publication. Changes include: using paint or black paper to black out the sky so it will appear clear in the exposed image, and removing the background of the image from the glass. This information has been recorded for each of the individual negatives where present.

This collection was catalogued in 2010 by interns who were digitizing the images for ‘The Lost Gallery: John Garstang and the Discovery of the Hittite World’ project funded by a ‘Your Heritage’ grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund in August-September 2010. Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000. The collection was indexed by personal name using the National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997. The collection was indexed by place name using data from the GeoNames geographical database which is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Material from the MISC collection was integrated into the collection during the Pilgrim Trust Funded 'Focus on Egypt' Project in 2015.

The 1905 annual report of the Institute of Archaeology records that Garstang gave the Institute of Archaeology the right to reproduce images and records from his expeditions. The term of the copyright of the original images last until 70 years after the death of the creator. It is unclear which individual actually created the negatives. It is believed that the majority were taken by Schliephack, whose exact date of death is unknown but it is believed he died more than 70 years ago. John Garstang died on the 12 September 1956, so the copyright of any images taken by Garstang expires on 12/10/2026. Some of the negatives are photographs of illustrations from publications; their copyright restrictions have been recorded under each description. The digital images are copyright of the University of Liverpool.

Images taken during the survey can also be found in the Miscellaneous Near Eastern Negatives collection (JG/X) and the Photographic Archives of ‘Bosanquet’s’ travels in Asia Minor (BOS).

The publication field has been used to record where the images have been published, if known. The images in this collection were published by John Garstang in several of his works on the Hittites. He initially published the result of the survey and some of the images in John Garstang, (1908) 'Notes on a journey through Asia Minor'. Liverpool Annals of Archaeology & Anthropology, 1, pp1-12, which also contains information about the 1907 survey. The images were also published in Garstang’s books on the Hittites, The land of the Hittites: an account of recent explorations and discoveries in Asia Minor, with descriptions of the Hittite monuments (London, 1910) [referred to in the catalogue as Land of the Hittites] and The Hittite Empire: Being a survey of the history, Geography and monuments of the Hittite Asia Minor and Syria, (London, 1929) [referred to in the catalogue as Hittite Empire].