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Merneptah Stele (1200 B.C.)
Lybian warrior (Meshwesh)
Suppiliuluma II
Medinhet Habu
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In the Late Bronze Age (XIII century BC.) the archaeological documents
record significant population shifts from the Aegean-Anatolian area towards
the Syro-Palestinian corridor.
These people are commonly
referred by the historians as the "Sea Peoples", since the beginning of the last century.
The
main written documents that show that the migratory phenomenon are:
1) the large hieroglyphic inscription at Karnak (Luxor, Egypt), written at the time of the Egyptian pharaoh Merneptah ( 1224-1214
or 1213-1203 BC); its content is also confirmed in a stele (the "Merneptah Stele") found
near it; 2) some tablets written in the Akkadian language on the comparability of Hammurabi
III (1195-1190), the last king of Ugarit (Ras Shamra, Syria)
that were found in his private archive
and 3) the hieroglyphic inscriptions of the mortuary temple of
Pharaoh Ramses III (1193-1155) at Medinhet Habu.
The Trojan War, according to the historian Eratosthenes of Cyrene,
took place between 1193 and 1183 BC
and the so-called "return of the Heraclides ", ie the Dorian invasion of
the Peloponnese, Crete and some Aegean islands, eighty years later
(1104 BC).
Archaeologically, the penetration
to the Near East Aegean-Anatolian area seems documented
by the appearance of ceramic type Late Helladic III C 1 b. In the hieroglyphic inscriptions, the people in question have
difficult deciphering names.
Hieroglyph, in fact, omits the transcription of the vowel sounds.
This makes difficult to read its exact words .
The
large inscription at Karnak describes the attack to Egypt in the 5th
year of the reign of Merneptah (1220 or 1209 BC) by a coalition
led by the Libyan king Meryey including, in addition to the Libyans (Lubu) and their allies Meshwesh (perhaps
Nubian or otherwise African), even the "peoples of the North": Teresh, Ekwesh, Lukka, Shardanas and Shekelesh.
The attack took place almost
simultaneously
to
a Canaanite rebellion, in the towns of Gaza, Askhelon and Yenoam,
and even - it seems -an Israelite one.
The
inscription go on, stating that the invaders, taking with them
their wives and children, were able to occupy for a few months a
territory located south of El Fayyum .
The decisive battle , however, saw a victory of the Egyptian army
and was fought in the unidentified resort of Pi-yer.
Merneptah states that he defeated the invaders, killing 6,000
soldiers and taking 9,000 prisoners.
To
be sure of the numbers, it was provided to cut off all the uncircumcised
penis from the dead bodies and the hands of all the
circumcised ones; among the latter, they were certainly counted the Ekwesh, Shekelesh and Shardanas, and
this attests at least
their
cultural proximity to Semitic populations if not a territorial
contiguity.
The
most indicative steps of the Ugarit correspondence, dated 1190 BC,
are:
a) the report of the Cyprus
ruler
concerning the presence of an enemy
fleet and the suggestion to the king of Ugarit to set up
defenses.
This stranger sovereign had been set up in Cyprus a few years ago by
the Hittite king Suppiliuluma II, which was handed down a victory
on the Cyprus fleet, around 1200 BC, using - probably - the ships
of Ugarit .
b ) the dramatic communication of the
Hittite
king
Suppiliuluma II
(1200-1182 BC), which attests his defeat in the face of an undentified enemy and the devastation of
his country;
c ) the response of Hammurabi III to the Cyprus ruler, in which,
after having justified that he had to send his troops and his ships
to Lycia (probably to defend the land of the Hittites, being their vassal), announces that the enemy attack
had already started and do not have the means to reject it.
This note will never be sent by impossibility.
Another tablet posting in Karnak indicates the name of the people that threatened
Ugarit: the Shekelesh (Sikalayu).
The Ugarit correspondence shows that, circa 1190, all
Anatolia was on fire and devastation had reached the Syrian coast.
The inscriptions at Medinhet Habu, in fact, indicate that, a few
years later, foreign populations had completely destroyed and
pillaged Lycia (Arzawa), the land of the Hittites (Hatti),
Cyprus, Cilicia, the city-state of Carchemish (on the
Turkish Syrian
boundaries) and directly threatened Egypt.
The
attack was carried out in the 8th year of the reign of Ramses III (1186 BC) by an alliance of five people close to the land of the
Amorites (Syria): in addition to Shekelesh they appear Pheleset, Tjeker, Weshesh and Denyen,
following with their women, children and household goods.
Also in this case the Egyptians repelled the invaders to Djahy, a
town in the land of Canaan.
The
war, however, was not ended, as the attackers launched a new
attack by sea, which was attended by Tueresh and Shardanas "of
the sea", supported by land by Lubu and Meshesh.
Egypt was forced to engage a fierce battle, which ended again with a
victory in the Nile delta. |
