Biblical Hittites

The Hittites, also spelled Hethites, were a group of people mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. Under the names בני-חת (bny-ḥt "children of Heth", who was the son of Canaan) and חתי (ḥty "native of Heth") they are described several times as living in or near Canaan between the time of Abraham (estimated to be between 2000 BC and 1500 BC) and the time of Ezra after the return of the Jews from the Babylonian exile (around 450 BC). Their ancestor was Heth (Hebrew: חֵת, Modern: H̱et, Tiberian: Ḥēṯ).

In the late 19th century, the biblical Hittites were identified with a newly discovered Indo-European-speaking empire of Anatolia, a major regional power through most of the second millennium BC, who therefore came to be known as the Hittites. This nomenclature is used today as a matter of convention, regardless of debates about possible identities between the Anatolian Hittite Empire and the biblical Hittites.