* We see the distribution of arms made by the scribes and
other officials of the royal arsenals represented in the
pictures at Medinet-Abu. The calling out of the classes was
represented in the Egyptian tombs of the XVIIIth dynasty, as
well as the distribution of supplies.
Once in the enemy’s country the army advanced in close order, the infantry in columns of four, the officers in rear, and the chariots either on the right or left flank, or in the intervals between divisions. Skirmishers thrown out to the front cleared the line of march, while detached parties, pushing right and left, collected supplies of cattle, grain, or drinking-water from the fields and unprotected villages. The main body was followed by the baggage train; it comprised not only supplies and stores, but cooking-utensils, coverings, and the entire paraphernalia of the carpenters’ and blacksmiths’ shops necessary for repairing bows, lances, daggers, and chariot-poles, the whole being piled up in four-wheeled carts drawn by asses or oxen. The army was accompanied by a swarm of non-combatants, scribes, soothsayers, priests, heralds, musicians, servants, and women of loose life, who were a serious cause of embarrassment to the generals, and a source of perpetual danger to military discipline. At nightfall they halted in a village, or more frequently bivouacked in an entrenched camp, marked out to suit the circumstances of the case. This entrenchment was always rectangular, its length being twice as great as its width, and was surrounded by a ditch, the earth from which, being banked up on the inside, formed a rampart from five to six feet in height; the exterior of this was then entirely faced with shields, square below, but circular in shape at the top. The entrance to the camp was by a single gate in one of the longer sides, and a plank served as a bridge across the trench, close to which two detachments mounted guard, armed with clubs and naked swords.
Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey.
The royal quarters were situated at one end of the camp. Here, within an enclosure, rose an immense tent, where the Pharaoh found all the luxury to which he was accustomed in his palaces, even to a portable chapel, in which each morning he could pour out water and burn incense to his father, Amon-Râ of Thebes. The princes of the blood who formed his escort, his shield-bearers and his generals, were crowded together hard by, and beyond, in closely packed lines, were the horses and chariots, the draught bullocks, the workshops and the stores.
Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Beato. It represents
the camp of Ramses II. before Qodshû: the upper angle of the
enclosure and part of the surrounding wall have been
destroyed by the Khâti, whose chariots are pouring in at the
breach. In the centre is the royal tent, surrounded by
scenes of military life. This picture has been sculptured
partly over an earlier one representing one of the episodes
of the battle; the latter had been covered with stucco, on
which the new subject was executed. Part of the stucco has
fallen away, and the king in his chariot, with a few other
figures, has reappeared, to the great detriment of the later
picture.