Week 10: Warfare in the Ancient World
Ancient History Resources for Homeschool and Personal Study. This weeks topics: Big Cats, The Chariot, Armor, The Trojan War, Kalhu, and The Spartan City-State.
Ancient History is studied through the collection of archeological evidence, written records and oral stories or myths. Just because evidence shows a particular belief or custom was common at a particular time does not mean that everyone in that civilization shared that belief. When you study the topics for this week, you can either go deep on one topic for the week and skip the others or you can do a new topic each day. This outline is just a suggested pace, you can go slower or faster as needed. This outline is intended to provide you with a place to start. You will still need to do your own research.
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| Helen on the Ramparts of Troy |
Homeschool Topics for Week 10
Ramesses II and His Big Cats
The Chariot
Ancient Armor
The Trojan War 1200 BC
Kalhu the capital of Assyria
The Spartan City-State 900 BC
Discussion Questions
Ramesses and His Big Cats
Ramesses II was extraordinarily active militarily and in building monuments. He made war against the Hittite king and signed the first known peace treaty. Both sides claimed a victory. He made war to the south into Nubia. He remodeled other Pharaoh's monuments. He put his cartouche on monuments he did not build. He built multiple temples. In his own palace, he built a private zoo. If you could have a zoo at your house, which animals would you want? Read/Watch Dr Seuss's If I Ran the Zoo for ideas.
Hunting with cheetahs was common in Ancient times. The cheetah was restrained with a single harness tether. Cheetahs went extinct in Mesopotamia due to the high demand.
Lion Pits
Lions were a dangerous beast in Mesopotamia. The Bible tells the story of a hole in the ground that was used to hold lions. Cicero talks of big cat hunters when he says, "About the leopards, the professional hunters are busy, acting on my orders. But there is an extraordinary scarcity of the beasts." Large cats were a symbol of power and as such, used graphically to display the power of the king. Read about exotic animal traffickers in Rome here.
The Chariot
Chariots were not used in battle as a fighting machine at first. Chariots were used to transport military leaders to the battle front and also to bring the musicians to the battle. Fighting was done by infantry on foot. Chariots usually had four solid wheels. The spoked two-wheeled chariots revamped military tactics in about 1700 BC. The Persians put blades on the hubs of their chariot wheels to cut down opponents. The Battle of Kadesh between Ramesses and the Hittites included archers on thousands of chariots.
Musicians were used in battle to make a loud noise and scare the opposing army. One example of a musician is a Cybele.
Ancient Armor
The Ancients had to make their own weapons and armor out of wood, stone, metal, bone, leather and sinew. You can see a list on Wikipedia of different types of ancient weapons. Bronze swords and Iron swords were about the same in that both could be bent during use. Iron was not quench hardened at first.
Kalhu Capital of Assyria
Kalhu was the capital city rebuilt on the ruins of an ancient ruin known as Calah used by Shalmaneser III. It was in use for over a hundred years. A library was kept in the capital which was discovered in disarray by archeologists. From the library, we learn about matters far and near that concerned the government. You can read some of the letters at the above link.
The biggest banquet happened at Kalhu. The "Banquet Stele" records in detail the guest list and the foods that were served. 47,074 people were invited including 5,000 dignitaries and ambassadors from other small countries. The celebration lasted for ten days. It is possible that the whole city became one big dining room in order for that many people to sit and eat.