Neša
Hittite palace at Kültepe
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 Shown within Turkey
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| Location | Kayseri Province, Turkey |
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| Region | Anatolia |
| Coordinates | 38°51′N 35°38′E / 38.850°N 35.633°ECoordinates: 38°51′N 35°38′E / 38.850°N 35.633°E |
| Type | Settlement |
| History | |
| Cultures | Hittite |
| Site notes | |
| Condition | In ruins |
Kültepe (Turkish: "Ash Hill") is an archaeological site in Kayseri Province, Turkey. The nearest modern city to Kültepe is Kayseri, about 20 km southwest. It consists of a tell, the actual Kültepe, and a lower town, where an Assyrian settlement was found. Its name in Assyrian texts from the 20th century BC was Kaneš; the later Hittites mostly called it Neša, occasionally Aniša.
Kaneš, inhabited continuously from the Chalcolithic to Roman times, flourished as an important Hattic, Hittite and Hurrian city, containing a large kārum (merchant colony) of the Old Assyrian Empire from ca. 21st to 18th centuries BC. This kārum appears to have served as "the administrative and distribution centre of the entire Assyrian colony network in Anatolia." A late (c 1400 BC) witness to an old tradition includes a king of Kaneš called Zipani among seventeen local city-kings who rose up against Naram-Sin of Akkad (ruled c.2254-2218 BC). It is the site of discovery of the earliest traces of the Hittite language, and the earliest attestation of any Indo-European language, dated to the 20th century BC.
The king of Zalpuwa, Uhna, raided Kanes, after which the Zalpuwans carried off the city's Šiuš idol. Pithana, the king of Kussara, conquered Neša "in the night, by force", but "did not do evil to anyone in it." Neša revolted against the rule of Pithana's son, Anitta, but Anitta quashed the revolt and made Neša his capital. Anitta further invaded Zalpuwa, captured its king Huzziya, and recovered the Šiuš idol for Neša.
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