On April 23, 2025, archaeologist and geologist Eberhard Zangger delivered a lecture in Zurich to alumni of Harvard, Stanford, Cambridge, Oxford, Yale, and Princeton, upon invitation by the Joint Alumni Forum. The lecture, titled “Lost Civilizations and the Stars: Decoding an Ancient Astronomical Sanctuary,” focused on the Hittite rock sanctuary of Yazılıkaya near Hattusa, whose function as a symbolic and technical lunisolar calendar has been under investigation since 2015.

The previously available YouTube lecture on the interpretation of the sanctuary dated from 2019. Since then, numerous new findings have emerged – among them the clear structuring of the sanctuary into distinct levels of the cosmos: the underworld, the earth, and the lower and upper heavens. These insights are presented for the first time in the new recording through vivid animated graphics.

Equally significant are the broader implications of this interpretation. It provides a shared interpretative framework for several objects and monuments that previously appeared isolated and enigmatic, including the Hittite spring sanctuary of Eflatunpınar, the Hittite ivory tablet from Megiddo, and the Intermediate Bronze Age silver cup from ˁAin Samiya.

Following the publication of these research findings on November 13, 2025, the presentation video can now be made publicly available. It provides interested parties with a compact, graphically presented overview of the correlations discussed in detail in the latest scientific publications.