Karabel relief

The Hittite / Luwian Karabel relief is a rock relief in the pass of the same name, between Torbalı and Kemalpaşa, about 20 km from İzmir in Turkey. Rock reliefs are a prominent aspect of Hittite art.

The monument originally consisted of four parts: two ruler figures carved into the cliff (Karabel A and B) and two inscriptions on boulders (Karabel C1 and C2). During the construction of a road through the pass between 1977 and 1982, all the reliefs except for Karabel A were destroyed. Karabel A shows a warrior marching to the right with a bow in his right hand and a spear in his left. There are Luwian hieroglyphs inscribed above his left arm. The relief is 1.5 m wide and 2.5 m high

The Karabel relief was damaged by unknown persons, presumed to be treasure hunters, in early 2019: a hole was drilled into the relief so that dynamite could be inserted and detonated.

Herodotus interpreted the figure as the Egyptian Pharaoh Sesostris. The relief was visited by the French traveller Charles Texier in 1839 – he published a description in 1862. After him, Karl Richard Lepsius visited it in 1840. Both accepted it as Egyptian. Heinrich Kiepert disproved...