Subject: Re: ane Hittite reliefs of Kadesh
Date: Wed, 07 Apr 1999 00:07:28 +0300
From: "Rex H. McTyeire" 
To: "David M. Hughes" , ane@oi.uchicago.edu

There was a detailed Hittite account of the engagement at Kadesh (excavated in Hattusas {Boghazkoy}. The current assessment is that the battle was "indecisive", moving a step from the previously dominant Egyptian position. There is a detailed assessment of this battle published, complete with graphical depictions of individual unit locations, and I read it several years ago. I can't reference it now...but I recommend it highly..the graphics communicate to nonmilitary readers the tactical events quite effectively. Not being a non-military reader, I do not take the "indecisive" position, but make the following conclusion given all available information: Ramses II lost on all counts.

Ramses II was a Captain at 10 years old, and accompanied his father, Seti 1, on earlier expeditions in southern Syria and Palestine. A stated position of the Dynasty was to recover Syrian territory lost during the reign of Akhenaton, decades earlier. About five years into his own reign, after some successes in the same area in which he had fought with his father, Ramses got ambitious. Recognizing Kadesh as strategically important, in fact the key to Egyptian resurgence in the North, Ramses set out with four divisions of infantry and chariots, at about 5,000 men each, augmented with an "auxiliary force" (I am not sure of the composition and size of this support force, but suggest it was composed of attached forces from Libyan, Palestinian, and/or Southern Syrian vassals. As events unfolded this force prevented a crushing defeat to Ramses, and probably saved his life.)

Ramses' stated objective was to take the fortification of Kadesh as a first and critical step toward regaining for Egypt all of Northern Syria. He assumed this would simply be a matter of consolidation and mopping up from the Kadesh position. Lets make that clear: (1) Take Kadesh, (2) Regain all of North Syria.

Kadesh was the strategic key to the area, and was the site of an earlier battle between Thutmose III and a Syrian insurrection under a Palestinian Prince. It remained an Egyptian outpost of influence from this first battle until the Egyptian decline under Akhenaton and successors, allowing Hittite expansion into the area. (There is also an account that Seti 1 took the city in an earlier incursion.) Recovering from Seti 1's occupation, the Hittites refortified the City, and deliberately garrisoned it as their primary Southern defensive bastion. Important to the City defense was its position on the Orontes, a major tactical obstacle to forces attacking from the South.

Ramses advanced following the coastal road through Palestine and Lebanon. At one point south of Kadesh, he detached a task force, primarily composed of his auxiliaries, to take Symria on the coast. This element was instructed to rejoin the main force at Kadesh by marching up the Eleutherus River. Believing the main Hittite Army was in Aleppo, Ramses and his forces crossed the Orontes from east to west at a ford site in a hasty manner, leaving some units stretched out along the approach roads. Still 8 miles from the city, Ramses advanced with only the first division to occupy a plain in front of the city. He began to encamp and wait for the remainder of his forces. This seperation of forces and forfeiture of any surprise was tactically foolish; but Ramses was apparently convinced the limited and engarrisoned force would not engage him in the open.

Muwatallis, King of the Hittites, was well aware of Ramses' objective and movements, and he had his very significantly augmented main army positioned behind the city proper. He had successfully used scouts and other intelligence operations to place himself in a stronger position, and did not hesitate to take advantage of Ramses weakness.

Ramses' limited and tired forces, beginning an encampment in the open, were surprised by a detachment of 2,500 Hittite chariots of a heavier type than his own, late on that first day. Hittites used three man chariots with a driver, shield bearer and a "launcher" of arrows and javelins. The Hittite ambush force, in full attack, first encountered the 2nd Division of Ramses, still moving toward the King's position, and routed it completely. Ramses with 5,000 men, and separated from his total force, was in peril in short order. The first division, disorganized and not defensively grouped, was then hit by the same chariot force of the Hittites, which did not slow down. The first division was surrounded and decimated, almost completely destroyed in place. Elements of the third and fourth Divisions were engaged as they approached, piecemeal; and the King himself was engaged with his household guard force and personal chariot force, completely surrounded.

Elements of the auxiliary forces, returning from Symria, joined the battle at a crucial moment, catching the Hittites on a flank or rear. The Hittite forces, unaware of how close they were to ending the reign of Ramses, were engaged on several flanks, and regrouped to redeploy across the river. They formed a defensive line on the bank, with all of Ramses battered forces scattered in front of them. Things were left thusly for the night.

The Hittite main army was never deployed, and the city garrison never involved. While Ramses was left in posession of the battlefield with significantly inferior forces, his first division was gone, the second scattered, and the third and fourth reduced and not deployed, and not in a consolidated position. He faced a rested chariot force across the river, the untouched garrison, and unknown main Army elements freely maneuvering against his disadvantage. Ramses quite sensibly withdrew, picking up elements of his dispersed divisions as he escaped south. The battle is called "indecisive" because the King lived, and was left in possession of the battlefield on that first engagement. Also on that battlefield was a dead division. Ramses' objective was the city..and not one arrow was fired over the walls.

The Hittites could be militarily faulted for not pressing the advantage on the second day, instead of a few minor skirmishes. But the counter argument is that their primary objective was defensive, and to protect the city: they succeeded. I interject that Muwatallis decided not to expend forces to crush an already defeated army. Ramses was defeated in one engagement, and did not touch the city, and north Syria remained Hittite. Muwatallis' forces actually advanced south to Damascus after Ramses' withdrawal.

Ramses failed to meet his military objectives, lost half his force, with the remainder ineffective and demoralized, and he lost significant territory in the aftermath. Egyptian diplomatic prestige would not fully recover, and the circumstances fueled another series of rebellions in South Syria and Palestine. That is not indecisive, that is defeat.

Ramses II would continue to challenge the Hittites for years to come, and made a few intrusive movements into North Syria...until the historical first Peace Treaty was signed between the Egytians and Hittites, but North Syria would never be his.

La Revedere:
Rex H. McTyeire
Bucharest, Romania
rexbo@customers.digiro.net

The palest ink is better than the best memory.   - Chinese Proverb

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