Page 78 - All About History - Issue 70-18

Hero or Villain?
JOHN DEE
RAMSES II
In his fifth regnal year, Ramses would use
another military conquest to enhance his now
established reputation as a great military leader.
Tensions between the Egyptian kingdom and
the Hittites rose once again, with the Hittites
recapturing land and trying to push their army
lines further down the country under the
instruction of Muwatalli II.
This campaign would span years and eventually
come to a climax in the city of Kadesh in 1274.
Fooled by two spies and choosing to act upon
faulty intelligence, Ramses and his men were
lured into an ambush. Staring both death and
defeat in the face, Ramses made the decisive move
to personally lead a counterattack against his
enemies that hopelessly outnumbered his force.
Unexpectedly, this decision would force Muwatalli
and his men to retreat to Kadesh’s city walls, unable monuments to himself and his Queen Nefertari
to defeat the formidable Ramses.
After many years of success on the battlefield,
capturing the cities of Dapur and Tunip by the
end of his reign’s first decade, Ramses was able
to surpass Thutmose III by carrying out the most
military campaigns by any Pharaoh.
However, as tensions flared once again in the
Northern territories, Ramses and Hattusili III,
the then ruler of the Hittites, established what
would become the first recorded example of an
international peace treaty in history, in order to
bring prosperity and to end the loss of life to
their peoples. Despite his achievements in battle,
Ramses was more than just an instinctive military
Antique illustration
of Ramses II at the
Battle of Karnak
78
“The architectural landscape of Egypt saw great
development under Ramses”
commander. As a very religious man, his first act Valley to a new site in the Eastern Delta, which he
as Pharaoh was to travel to the city of Thebes to named Pi-Ramesses (which literally translated as
celebrate the religious festival of Opet, so that he ‘the House of Ramses’).
could supposedly meet the god Amon of Karnak at Laden with lush gardens, smooth limestone
the Temple of Luxor. terraces and towering temples, this location would
Upon his return from the festival, the Pharaoh go on to rival the magnificence of Thebes and
made a detour in his journey to Abydos where he become one the most flourishing cities in Egypt,
went to continue work on a temple that had begun even up to a century after Ramses’s death. The
construction under his father. need for skilled labourers and volunteers expanded
The architectural landscape of Egypt saw great industry and the improvements to the cities meant
development under Ramses. that the places where Egyptian citizens went about
Numerous grand monuments were erected and their everyday lives were now full of opportunity to
restoration projects undertaken including the grand carry out their civic duties.
Despite the arguably unquestionable triumphs of
at Abu Simbel in Nubia, the mortuary temple, Ramses in war, architecture and society, no person’s
Ramesseum, in Luxor, the Hall at Karnak, the New path to the top is ever untarnished.
Palace at Avaris, the completed complex at Abydos It was not unlike new leaders to tear down
and hundreds of other buildings and statues of monuments presenting the success of Pharaohs
himself across the kingdom. that came before them, but Ramses arguably did
Arguably one of the not follow in the footsteps of his predecessors
most significant out of spite, as many of them had, but out
developments of of a need to inflate his ego. Monuments,
his time was Defining temples and statues erected by previous
the decision moment Pharaohs, including Chefren’s pyramid
to move the Battle of Kadesh at Giza, were stripped of their
Although there are vastly contradicting
capital from materials in order to make way for all
accounts of how the battle concluded, the
Thebes in Battle of Kadesh became the largest chariot of the structures erected by Ramses.
the Nile battle to have ever been fought and is widely As for the buildings, walls and pillars
considered to be the most well documented
battle in ancient history. It was here that The temple at Abu Simbel is regarded
Ramses was able to solidify Egypt’s position as one of the most spectacular of
as a powerhouse in the ancient world Ramses’s commissions
and add to his reputation as a great
military strategist.
1274 BCE