Hannahanna is the great grandmother goddess of the Hittites. She features in several myths usually following the exploits of her children's children. She shows up to save the world from the clutches of Hahhima the Frost Demon after the defeat of the Gods.
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Her name comes from hanna, meaning grandmother. The double usage makes her a Great Grandmother or the grandmother of grandmothers. Hannahanna is eternal. She's older than the earth and sky, created by the cosmic life force.
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She teaches the younger gods about ancient medicine, rites and rituals. They need to pass the wisdom down to the humans of the mortal realm. Sometimes the humans are slow to catch on.
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Entire civilizations collapse while the Gods are waiting for them to develop the wheel. Thus at various times during the evolution of humans, the Gods also send teachers or wise ones among them.
The wise ones impart new skills. They teach humans the way to smelt ores, how to use medicinal herbs, how to spin wool fibers and otherwise assist the evolution of humanity.
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In Mesopotamia, Anatolia and surrounding regions, humans are created to serve the Gods. This mentality is at the core of religion. If the humans don't fulfill their tasks, or if they fail to show respect to the gods, the deities get angry and sicken or torment them.
While the humans live to serve the gods, at the same time the Gods have to care for the humans. If the people all get sick and die, who will supply the food of the Gods, and who will tend their houses of worship?
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Who will provide with Gods with praises, entertainments and festivals? Sometimes a tutelary deity leaves her town because of neglectful worship, or symbolically dies. This can cause land infertility, bad weather, earthquakes, social destruction by inner or outer forces, or economic collapse.
Hannahanna plays little part in the antics of the younger Gods. She prefers peace and quiet. She's considered a stabilizing entity, a cosmic primordial power of wholistic balance, pre-dating the ancient deities.
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She casts an aura of harmony. Hannahanna is often called upon to find divinities who go missing, such as the the God Telipinu or the Sun God or Goddess.
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In a partly-lost myth, Hannahanna gets frustrated and disappears in anger. When she vanishes, livestock such as cows and goats suffocate, and no mother cares for her children. A terrible darkness falls upon the land.
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She must banish her anger to the Dark Earth (Dankuš daganzipaš, Dankuš tekan) the Hittite Underworld. After releasing her anger into the Dark Earth she returns rejoicing. Mothers care once more for their young ones and everyone can breathe again.
Another way of expelling her anger is by burning brushwood, twigs and small branches. As a mother goddess she's connected to the nurturing force of trees. She allows the vapor to enter her body and cleanse her of negative energy.
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Hannahanna is not known to have a consort, though she may have borne / created up to eighty children, who also have children. It could be yet another source of the thousands of Goddesses, Gods, sukkals, demons, spirits and supernatural entities of the Hittite pantheon.
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