The register rules: Inaras
Evidence dossier 228 — Inaras. Every exhibit catalogued, every ruling stated with its grounds.
At a Glance
- Canonical form: Inaras
- Original script: 𒀭𒄿𒈾𒊏
- Pantheon: Hittite
- Convention: the tradition’s own scholarly transliteration standard
- False forms on record: 0
- Contested forms: none attested
- Series: The Canonical Register, No. 228 of 542
The Evidence
Exhibit 1 — the attestation. The attested form is 𒀭𒄿𒈾𒊏, from the tradition's own record. The canonical transliteration is Inaras.
Exhibit 2 — the flattened form. The plain form inaras differs from the canonical Inaras only by convention of display — case, not content. It is acceptable everywhere: in legacy systems, in plain-text citation, in the DNS itself. What is not acceptable is what follows in the register: respellings that change the letters, not just their case.
Exhibit 3 — the physical record. The texts that name Inaras were excavated from the Hittite royal archives at Boğazköy-Hattusa and related sites in central Anatolia, including temple storerooms and administrative buildings within the citadel. The tablets belong to the corpus of Hittite cuneiform literature preserved in the imperial chancery, with duplicates and parallels in Hurrian, Hattic, Luwian, and other Anatolian traditions. Many were written or copied during the Empire period (c. 1400–1180 BCE), though some compositions may descend from older oral or written sources. The clay tablets were baked, either deliberately or by the fire that destroyed the city, which helped preserve them for modern excavation and study.
Exhibit 4 — the continuing record. Inaras survives in scholarly memory as the Hittite Mistress of Animals and the architect of the dragon's defeat. She appears in studies of Indo-European dragon combat, comparative mythology, and the role of goddesses in ancient Near Eastern narrative.
The Convention's Own History
Every tradition in this register has its own scholarly transliteration standard, built by its own specialists over decades or centuries, and the register follows each on its own terms: the tradition’s own standard. The principle that unifies them is the one the whole project stands on: a name is evidence, and evidence is not negotiable — not for keyboards, not for convenience, not for anyone.
The Protocol's Position
Can the canonical form live in the address bar? Almost always, yes. IDNA 2008 admits every mark this register defends — the DNS stores them as `xn--` punycode and modern browsers render them natively. The real frictions are practical, not legal: some registrars stock only part of the IDN space, so a theoretically valid name can be temporarily unbuyable; and stacked combinations (an acute riding a macron) remain awkward to type on mobile keyboards even where the protocol accepts them.
The project's answer is a ranked ladder, not a compromise: the full restoration first, then attested fallbacks in descending order of completeness. The ladder's lowest rung, plain ASCII, is a vehicle for legacy systems — sanctioned, but never presented as the scholarly form.
The Verdict
Case closed on Inaras: canonical, cited, and defended. The keyboard form inaras is the same name in another register of display — always acceptable. The register's files remain open: if a source surfaces that changes any line of this entry, the entry changes. Until then, the temple at /inaras/ holds the canonical form.
The docket for this ruling: no false forms on the docket; no contested forms attested; the attestation rests on 8 cited sources — CTH 321 — The Myth of Illuyanka., Watkins, C., How to Kill a Dragon (1995)., Hoffner, H. A., "The Hittite Myth of Illuyankas," JAOS (1962)..
The Register Continues
The register holds 542 entries like this one — each temple with its own ruling. Read the temple's founding dispatch for the story, its Restoration File for the philology, its Resonance File for the industries, or the whole archive end to end.
Continue the register — previous entry: Inanna (read it) · next entry: Inari (read it).
The Canonical Register is written from the same canonical record as the lexicon itself. If a false form is missing from this page, it is because the evidence does not support calling it false — or because we have not seen it yet. Show us, with a citation, and the register will answer.