One of these generals was a man named Phanes of Helicarnassus, a Greek mercenary who had once served with the Egyptian army. ‘I’m not surprised,’ Phanes said. ‘I used to work for the Pharaoh, and he was weak then. My sons could overthrow his army with their toys.’
Cambyses laughed. This was a promising start. ‘How best should we enter Egypt?’ he asked this man who had once been a general for the pharaoh.
‘The desert is largely unguarded’, Phanes told him, ‘but the sun and the sands are their own guardians. We must ally with Bedouin nomads. They know the desert, and can take us on a route with plenty of food and water for the army.’ Cambyses agreed with Phanes’s assessment, and sent emissaries to make an alliance with the nomads. The alliance was quickly agreed, and soon the nomads were leading a massive Persian army – including their legendary Immortals, the Emperor’s personal guard – across the desert and into Egypt.
The pharaoh, Psamtik III, knew he was in trouble. His Greek allies had been deserting him for some time, and now his border scouts had brought news that a Persian army was approaching. He was not going to give up his kingdom too easily, however. When the Assyrians had helped put his ancestors on the throne, they had also brought improvements in chariot-making and superior khopesh swords. He knew that the chariots were very fast and stable shooting platforms, and that his mobile archers were his best hope to keep the Persians out.
He also had something else up his sleeve, which he hoped would turn things around: the two sons of Phanes were caught and held hostage. Psamtik sent spies to the Persian army to meet secretly with Phanes. ‘We have your sons,’ the Egyptian told Phanes. ‘If you would change sides again, and help us drive off the Persians, we will shower them with gold. If not, we will kill them.’ This blackmail did not impress Phanes, who knew he’d be killed if he so much as took a step away from the service of Cambyses.
Soon, the Persians massed before the gates of the city of Pelusium, where Psamtik and his army were waiting. Psamtik was frantic by now, and had Phanes’s sons brought out to the top of the wall. In a last desperate attempt to distract Phanes from taking part on Cambyses’ side, Psamtik had the boys’ throats cut in front of their father. The blood was drained into a bowl and mixed with wine, from which all the Egyptian soldiers drank. Psamtik had hoped this would drive Phanes wild with fear and grief, and cause him to take his mercenaries out of the invading army and flee. He had misjudged the mercenary, however, who was instead driven to a greater fury and thirst for revenge. Phanes led his men in the spearhead of the attack, backed up by the dreaded and unbeaten Immortals.
When Cambyses took over Egypt, he made sure that he was crowned as pharaoh by all the traditional rituals and ceremony – which included being anointed by priests of Set and Horus, who wore headdresses representing their respective gods.
CAMBYSES – OUTRAGE OR OPEN ARMS?
The Greek writer Herodotus describes Cambyses looting palaces, deliberately defiling temples, slaughtering the sacred Apis Bull, and generally trampling all over the society he had just taken over. Herodotus was called the Father of History by the Roman writer Cicero, and the Father of Lies by a lot of others. At one time, it was said that he included too much fantasy in his histories, but now he has been somewhat rehabilitated. So, was he lying or not?
Herodotus was writing only 75 years after Cambyses died, but he was Greek, and at this time the Persian Empire was Greece’s main enemy. Propaganda in his writings was a political necessity. In other words, he had to show a leader of the ‘bad guys’ doing bad things.
We do, however, also have the autobiography of an Egyptian priest, Udjahorusnet, who lived through Cambyses’ rule, and was one of his advisers. We know from his writings that both native Egyptian nobles, Jews, Libyans, and other minorities all welcomed the new ruler. Udjahorusnet also tells us that Cambyses went out of his way – at least before his campaigns started going horribly wrong – to avoid offending Egyptian sensibilities.
Chariots swarmed forward from each army, looping around their enemies and shooting arrows into the crowds of running warriors. As Psamtik had hoped, his chariots were faster and more stable to shoot from, but the brave charioteers were simply outnumbered. Persian archers brought down the horses, while spearmen finished off the charioteers. Cambyses then ordered his Immortals into the fray, and they charged into the mass of Egyptian defenders around the city. The Egyptians were no match for the Immortals, who hacked and slashed with wild abandon, slaughtering the defenders. Swords and axes smashed through wooden spear-hafts and Egyptian flesh with equal ease, and the city was firmly in Persian hands by the end of the day. The lands outside were paved with skulls, as, according to the Greek physician Ctesias, fifty thousand Egyptians and seven thousand Persians died that day.
Psamtik himself, however, had fled almost as soon as the battle began, and Cambyses soon left the battlefield as well, in hot pursuit. Cambyses chased Psamtik all the way to the city of Memphis, at the heart of the Nile Delta. There, Psamtik gathered his personal bodyguard around him, but they were few in number, and the army had already been smashed at Pelusium. It was easy for Cambyses to break down the gates of Psamtik’s palace, kill his guards, and put the pharaoh in chains. Since Psamtik had been a weak king, with little support from his people, there was not much resistance.
In fact, the Egyptians were quite happy to see a stronger leader as pharaoh. Cambyses wanted to keep things that way, and so he made sure to show respect to Egyptian ways. His coronation as pharaoh was conducted in the traditional way, in which he was anointed with oils by priests dressed as the various gods. He was flanked by priests dressed as Horus and Set, and had carvings made showing him blessed by the pair. Soon, Cambyses returned to his own capital of Susa, dragging Psamtik in chains. There, he executed the former pharaoh. He was not done with Egypt yet, however, and remained in the role of pharaoh. Some parts of the country were very remote and had little contact with the capital, so they needed to know who was now in charge. Egypt also had other enemies, who were now enemies of the Persian Empire, and Cambyses was determined to show them that his will was law.
Egyptian heavy infantryman of the 19th Dynasty, c.1250 BC by Angus McBride. (Osprey Publishing)
Made confident by his conquest of Egypt, Cambyses decided to lead an army of Persians, Egyptians, and mercenaries south along the Nile into Nubia. This campaign did not go as well. Without local nomads to show them where to find food and water, they soon ran out of both. Without even meeting their enemy, the army was reduced to cannibalism to survive as it crawled home.
Next he sent fifty thousand men west into the desert in search of the Siwa oasis. Somewhere along the route, a huge sandstorm blew up and enfolded his struggling army. First blinded, then buried, not a single man of that army was ever seen again. Finally, he planned to invade Carthage, but was enraged and embarrassed when his Phoenician ship captains refused to attack the city that their own families had founded. With each of these defeats and embarrassments, Cambyses became less popular with his subjects, and he was also under threat at home. After only three years as pharaoh, he died in disgrace. Some say he was murdered by ambitious underlings or by his family, while others say he accidentally stabbed himself while mounting his horse.
With Cambyses dead, there was a brief rebellion by some of the Egyptian nobility, but this was quickly crushed by the Persians and their new ruler, Darius. Egypt would then be ruled at a distance from Persia, until Alexander the Great defeated the Persian Empire and began the Ptolemaic dynasty that would lead to Cleopatra.
Weapons and Tactics of Ancient Egypt
Warfare between the gods, as between men, used a wide range of weapons known to the Egyptians. The gods, despite their innate powers, still used spears, axes and khopeshes, albeit larger and grander than the weapons used by their mortal allies and followers. They were the same weapons that the armies of Psamtik and Cambyses also used, and, of course, were the same weapons that Thoth magically strengthened to aid Horus’s fol
lowers. These weapons and their tactics would be used in the same fashion by the followers of the rival gods as they would by the armies of history.
A modern replica of a khopesh, which the author has used in re-enactment. (Author’s Collection)
The khopesh was essentially a sickle-shaped sword, with the edge on the outside. Because they were usually made of bronze or copper, they were normally cast in a mould, rather than forged by a smith. Although it is the most recognizable of Ancient Egyptian weapons, the khopesh originated in Canaan and Mesopotamia, where it had a much longer handle and was used as a kind of war axe. When brought to Egypt it was adapted to single-handed use, as Egyptian soldiers both by training and preference used a wicker shield in one hand and a single-handed weapon in the other.
The khopesh was primarily a slashing weapon, and the curvature of the blade meant that, upon impact, a greater pressure was exerted on the target than would be delivered by a straight edge. The blade was thicker and heavier than a straight-bladed equivalent would have been. Normal procedure would have been for a soldier to defend himself with his shield, while using the khopesh either in wide cuts at the enemy’s body, or to strike at the head as he would use a mace.
Because copper and bronze are relatively soft metals, the thick edge of a khopesh could be blunted easily, and it is therefore unlikely that a khopesh would have been used to block or parry blade-to-blade. However, the design does include features clearly intended to make the weapon more versatile in combat. The tip is weighted and in line with the hilt and base of the blade, so it was perfectly possible to thrust or jab at an opponent’s face. The non-sharpened inside of the curve, if the weapon was reversed or dual-wielded, could be used to catch an opponent’s arm or weapon and deflect it. Prior to the New Kingdom’s straighter-bladed variant, the weighted tip also had a rear-facing spur, which could hook the edge of an enemy’s shield and pull it away, thus exposing him to attack. The khopesh fell out of common use in the early 12th century BC, as it was superseded by straight swords introduced to Egypt by the Sea Peoples.
Chariots came to Egypt, like so much military technology, from the Hyksos. By 1500 BC, the pharaoh had over a thousand of them at his command. The Egyptians wanted a lightweight, manoeuvrable chariot for fast strikes – essentially to do the job that mounted cavalry would do much later – but using archers from a mobile shooting platform. This was a two-man vehicle drawn by two horses, carrying a driver and archer. It was a D-shaped wooden platform, usually sycamore, with a waist-high railing around the front and sides. For war, wooden walls were fitted, sometimes with laminated leather or gilded decoration, to stop arrows or spears from getting through to the occupants.
Rameses the Great shooting from a (driverless!) chariot in a relief from the temple at Abu Simbel. (PRISMA ARCHIVO / Alamy)
Where other societies’ chariots had an axle in the centre of the floor, the Egyptians put it directly under the rear edge. This meant that the body of the chariot wouldn’t tip back and forward as it went over bumps, and would remain a stable platform from which to shoot arrows. The war chariot would have two quivers for arrows slung from the sides at the rear, and a sheath for bows and one for javelins slung from the sides nearer the front. The Egyptian chariot was remarkably lightweight, weighing perhaps as little as 35kg, and could be lifted by one man alone, for example to right the vehicle if it had been overturned. This made it faster than the heavier chariots of the Hittites or other enemies.
The Egyptians used chariots for two main purposes. Firstly, they would protect the vital infantrymen by engaging enemy chariots. The lighter, faster Egyptian chariots would charge down the oncoming enemy chariots and pass between them. They could then loop round and engage each enemy chariot from the rear, as the heavier enemy vehicles could neither outrun nor out-turn them. Secondly, they were used as fast hit-and-run forces to stake out enemy units most dangerous to the infantry, such as archers. The typical strategy would be to send a stream of chariots towards the enemy group being targeted, and have the archers aboard shoot as rapidly as possible into the enemy while the driver wheeled the chariot in a tight turn before the enemy, in order to get out of the way of the next chariot in the stream behind him. The chariots could then retreat, loop round and repeat the attack until they ran out of arrows, or turn back to make a similar attack on another part of the enemy force. Afterwards, the chariots could harry retreating forces with any remaining arrows or with spears.
Egyptian Archer from the Middle Kingdom 2055-1650 BC by Peter Bull. (Osprey Publishing)
Modern tests have shown that a squadron of around fifty Egyptian chariots wheeling in front of an enemy force for the archers to shoot at could unleash up to a thousand arrows a minute onto a specific grouping of the enemy. This is not much less than the rate of fire delivered by the chain-gun on a modern AH-64 Apache helicopter gunship.
What is perhaps most interesting is that the charioteers became a new class of their own. Being a charioteer was an expensive business, as one had to pay for the upkeep of five servants, the horses, and the vehicle. This led to the creation of a slightly more aristocratic class of Egyptian warrior, and being a charioteer was seen as socially and politically significant. The chariots were also followed by chariot runners, specialized infantrymen not unlike later panzer-grenadiers. These would run along behind the chariots during engagements with enemy chariots, finish off wounded enemy charioteers, and destroy their vehicles while the Egyptian chariots wheeled. They would also recover fallen Egyptian weapons or personnel.
By the first millennium BC, horse-borne cavalry had largely replaced the chariot in Egyptian warfare.
The first Egyptian bows, as elsewhere in the world, were horn bows, made from antelope horns with a wooden section in the middle. By the beginning of Dynastic times, recurve bows made entirely of wood had replaced horn. During the Old Kingdom, the recurve bow was largely abandoned in favour of the simple bow, now known as the self bow. This was a two-metre-long wooden bow, made of acacia wood and slightly curved at both ends. The self bow remained in use with the Egyptian military throughout the Middle and New Kingdoms, even though composite bows had been introduced by the Hyksos, and recurve bows had returned.
The Hyksos bow brought horn and sinew back to Egyptian archery. It was a recurved bow, shortened and with a pre-existing tension in the wood. Horn, which could take compression, supported the side of the bow facing the archer, while sinew, which could stretch, was bonded to the wood on the side facing the enemy, the whole thing then secured with bark. All of this meant that it had a lot more power and a higher draw weight, in a bow only three to four feet long. The complexity also made the compound bow more difficult to produce and to maintain.
Because re-stringing the compound bow was often a two-man job, it was more common to issue these weapons to chariot archers. The extra power of this bow was a useful frontline weapon against enemies in scale armour, and Egyptian chariots were used for fast archery attacks on targeted areas, so they needed the stronger weapon. The driver could then also assist the archer in re-stringing.
Archers on foot retained the simple self bow throughout the New Kingdom. These were simpler to mass produce, required less maintenance by the infantry, and were used against unarmoured infantry and fleeing enemies.
Different types of arrows were used by Egyptian archers for different purposes. The arrow shaft was made of reed, with three feathers and an arrowhead. The basic arrowhead was flint, with two trailing barbs, although other types of stone and even wooden arrowheads were used alongside these. By the second millennium BC, bronze arrowheads had been introduced, and these were effective when shot from a composite bow in piercing scale armour. Later, barbed iron arrowheads were not unknown, though iron remained a relatively rare and precious metal in Egypt. There were even blunt arrowheads for practice-shooting, and bird-hunting.
In pre-Dynastic times, through to the Old Kingdom, Egyptian soldiers wore only a linen kilt and carried a shield. The blazing sun of Egypt made th
e wearing of true armour almost unbearably hot, but as Egypt’s enemies began to wield better weapons, the need for some form of proper armour arose.
The most common type of protection worn by Egyptian soldiers was not really much in the way of armour; two wide bands of leather crossed the chest and back. This provided a little protection from reed arrows, but was more useful for fending off glancing cuts from knives. This type of armour could be worn by any soldier, but was most commonly seen worn by charioteers, perhaps as protection against small stones thrown upward by the wheels.
Starting around the reign of Amenhotep II, scale armour of Persian design began to be used by elite units, eventually becoming more widespread as the New Kingdom went on. This was incorporated into the Egyptian military while there was a stronger Asiatic influence on the kingdom, as well as being taken from defeated enemies. Scale armour was made from scales of hardened leather or bronze attached to a linen or soft leather tunic. This type of armour is effective against arrows and descending blows, but soldiers quickly learned to strike upwards with daggers or thrusting swords to penetrate a line of scales.
Plate armour, though used elsewhere in the regions surrounding the Mediterranean, was never used in Egypt, simply because large sheets of metal were heated up too much by the sun. There would have been a real danger of wearers being burned by their own armour. This problem also applied to metal helmets, but some bronze helmets have been found in Egypt. These are thought by archaeologists to have been worn by foreign mercenaries, or to be plunder taken from defeated enemies.
The War of Horus and Set Page 6