Hittites used germ warfare 3,500 years ago

LONDON: The use of biological weapons dates back almost 3,500 years, if modern researchers are to be believed, it was an ancient Middle-Eastern empire which had mastered the art of germ warfare to conquer enemy territories.

According to a study by the researchers in Europe, the Hittites of Anatolia, whose empire stretched from modern-day Turkey to northern Syria, used to send infected rams to their enemies to weaken them with tularaemia, the disease which can cause skin cancer and respiratory failure.

"There is no doubt that these were the first weapons of mass destruction. They were waging bio-terrorism," lead researcher Dr Siro Trevisanato, an Italian scientist, was quoted by the daily as saying.

Dr Trevisanato and his fellow researchers spent years searching through ancient accounts of Hittite conquests before coming to the conclusion.

In 1325 BC, when the Hittites sacked the Phoenician city of Symra, on the borders of Lebanon and Syria, a mysterious plague was recorded.

"This is the first time we hear of the so-called Hittite Plague. It appears in several documents. In my view, it is no accident that it coincides with the first documented description of tularaemia," he said.

The plague was described in letters to the Egyptian King Akhenaten. The letter reports that donkeys, which also carry the disease, were banned from the city, in an attempt to stop the illness.

The method of attack was simple. The Hittites would leave the sheep outside the targeted city. Locals would bring them in and either breed or eat them, spreading the disease.

However, Dr Trevisanato said that the Hittites had to pay a high price for their tactics. An epidemic of the disease weakened their ranks a few years after the Symra attack.