I was a wretch who lived in the era of tyrants. A wretch whom the gods turned into a coward. The most pitiable of all wretches, the most repulsive. A deceitful palace scribe who fed his heart with flattery, his mind with hatred. A two-faced ceremonial man who faithfully followed the orders of the king of the Hatti, hiding his deep pain behind a mask of happiness more impenetrable than bronze, the aristocratic hatred that nestled in his body beneath his noble clothes. The most undignified man on earth. He chose to remain silent, with his hands crossed on his chest with formality, as loyalty to his king demanded, when the woman he loved died of love. The shame of men. The most despicable of the licentious who, instead of choosing the grandeur of death from love, did not hesitate to resort to the imposing shadow of his insignificant entity, which grew ever larger behind the stone walls of the palace. I, Patasana, the chief scribe of the palace, who swims among the dead. He whom the gods wrote on my forehead: "He will writhe in pain for eternity."

An excavation in an ancient Hittite city, near Gaziantep. Tablets written three thousand years ago. Murders that begin when the tablets are discovered. The confessions of the scribe Patasana. Dark secrets under the bright southeastern sun. The end of the Hittites, the Assyrians... The final periods of the Ottomans, the Armenians... Turkey today, the Kurds... Brotherly blood flowing... The unchanging fate of this land: violence and love... An elegy to the blood-soaked history of this land... A song to the rich tradition of this land...