The Battle Of Kadesh: The Uneniable Proof Of War

Is it greed? Or even possibly power? Or even just for the enjoyment? Nobody knows why war has started but we do know that war has been going on since man was born, there is an undeniable proof of war all throughout history. War has been compared to as a chest match, the whit and strategy of one general versus another army to army; some generals chose to just try to outpower their enemies, while others tried to outsmart them. Phillip De Souza in The Ancient World at War writ “Once people have invested in one location, there is something to be both lost and gained through combat.” Jebel Sahaba was a burial site that was discovered in Sudan containing fifty-eight skeletons with almost half of them having stone marks and penetration marks in
their skulls (The Ancient World at War), this is just one of the many discoveries to show that war has been going on for longer then we know. The first recorded war however they do know about. The Battle of Kadesh was the first battle ever recorded.
The battle was fought between Egypt and the Hittites. Kadesh was a city that is now located in modern day Syria, it was often known as one of the most important trade centers during the ancient times. The Hittites were a small nation in Anatolia but eventually grew and around 1530 BC replaced the city-state Babylon. The battle began in 1275 B.C.E. The commander of Egypt was Ramses II who has been known as one of Egypt’s greatest warrior to have ever lived. “Ramses II turned his attention on Palestine and Syria and undertook a series of military incursions that brought him into direct conflict with the Hittites and resulted in the battle at Kadesh.” (Richard A. Gabriel). In this war he showed that he was a very bold and optimistic commander being outnumbered yet still giving the orders to attack and he expected to win. The commander of the Hittites was Muwatallis II he was considered more of a tactician, using ambushes and surprises as his main technique in war rather than straight man to man
combat. The Egyptians were said to have around a 20,000 man army, they were not really focused on their armies at this time because they were mostly surrounded by desert which came as no physical threat.
The Hittites had around 50,000 men. During this war they used spears, bows, swords, as well as shields; but their most important piece of equipment during this war was the chariot. Also like I mentioned above Commander Muwatalllis was a tactician, he started the war off with a sneak attack sending a bunch of soldiers on chariots to quickly take out small groups of the invading Egyptians scouts. And because of this the location of the Hittites became hard to keep track of. There is knowledge of a scout reporting that the Hittites were 200km away but truly they were only 11 km away. Another way that the Hittites got an advantage was that Ramses split up his army and marched them further out (which also increases the distance between the groups) thinking he had time to send reinforcements if needed before battle. The Hittites were of course closer than expected and instantly wiped out groups of soldiers before back up could arrive. Ramses at this point knew that the only way to have a fighting chance was to just try to overpower their enemies, which just so happened to be their strong suite. This was extremely effective because the Hittites thought that Ramses and his army were practically gone and they were looting their camps making them very vulnerable to attacks. The Egyptians
eventually were able to trap the Hittites on the river of Orontes forcing them to either swim across (a lot of soldiers drowned swimming) or to fight until death. Forcing the Hittites to come to agreement to end the war. The result of the Battle of Kadesh back changes depending on what side you asked but historians have that it ended in a Peace treaty; according to Ramses II the peace treaty would bring “peace and brotherhood between us forever” although the treaty only lasted until the death of Ramses. The peace treaty was proposed by the Hittites to Ramses and Egypt, saying that they could not rebuild Kadesh, but in return they will end all differences between them. Two copies were made of this treaty one in Hieroglyph and one in Akaddian both of which have been discovered and are still intact. The tablets in which the treaties were written on are currently in the museum of the Ancient Orient in Istanbul.