10
The king summoned Commander Ahmose Ebana and said to him, “I entrust to you Thebes’ western shore. Attack it or lay siege to it as you think fit, taking the inspiration for your plans from the conditions around you.”
The men set to thinking about the plan of attack for Thebes. Commander Mheb said, “The walls of Thebes are well-built, and intimidating, and will cost the attackers many lives. However, they must be assailed, for the southern gates are the city's only point of access.”
Commander Deeb said, “It is more effective for attackers to lay siege to a city and starve it into submission, but we cannot think even for a moment of starving Thebes. Thus, the only way open to us is to attack its walls. We are not without means of attack for the walls such as ladders and siege towers, but what we have is still not sufficient and we hope that adequate quantities of these will reach us. In any case, if the price of Thebes is high, we will pay it cheerfully.”
Ahmose said, “That is right. We must not waste time, for our people are penned up inside the city's walls and they are likely to be exposed to our barbaric enemy's revenge.”
The same day, the fleet advanced toward the western shore of Thebes and found before it a fleet belonging to the Herdsmen, which they had collected from the ships that had fled from Hierakonpolis. The Egyptian navy fell upon it and the two fleets engaged in a violent battle, but the Egyptians’ superiority in numbers of men and ships was large and they tightened the noose around the enemy and subjected it to a withering fire.
Ahmose sent battalions of bowmen and lancers to test the defending forces. They shot their arrows at widely separated points along the great wall and discovered that the Herdsmen had filled it with the toughest guards and an inexhaustible supply of weapons. The Egyptian commanders had been organizing their forces and when the order to attack was issued, they sent successive platoons of their men to different parts of the valley to attack the walls at widely separated points, the men protected by their long armor. The enemy's arrows fell on them in a devastating rain and the men aimed their bows at the openings in the impregnable walls. The fighting proceeded without mercy, the camp sending out company after company of soldiers eager for the fight. These fought with death-defying boldness and paid dearly for their daring, and the day ended with a terrible massacre, so that the king, alarmed at the sight of the wounded and fallen, cried out in anger, “My troops care nothing for Death, and Death reaps them like a harvest.”
Casting glances of fascination and horror at the field, Hur said, “What a battle, my lord! I see bodies everywhere on the field.”
Commander Mheb, his face dark, his clothes dust-stained, said, ‘Are we not staring Death itself in the face as we attack?”
Ahmose said, “I will not drive my army to certain destruction. It seems better to me to send a limited number of men behind siege towers, so that the openings in the enemy's wall fill with the dead.”
The king remained in a state of high excitement, which the news borne by the messengers, that the Egyptian fleet had overcome the remains of the Herdsmen's fleet and become the unchallenged master of the Nile, did nothing to reduce. That evening, the messenger whom he had sent to his family in Napata returned carrying a message from Tetisheri. Ahmose smoothed the letter in his hands and read as follows:
From Tetisheri to my grandson and lord, Pharaoh of Egypt, Ahmose son of Kamose, whose dear life I pray the Generous Lord may preserve, guiding his judgment to the truth, his heart to the faith, and his hand to the slaying of his enemy. Your messenger reached us bringing the announcement of the death of our brave departed Kamose and informing me of his final words addressed to me. It seems to me proper that, while you are fighting our enemy, I should write a few lines devoted to the mention of that which has wrung the hearts of us all, for my heart has tasted death twice in one short life. But condolences are no stranger to one who lives in the furnace of a terrible battle, where lives are sold cheap and the courageous man rushes to meet Death. I will not hide from you that, despite my pain and grief, a messenger bringing me news of the death of Kamose and our army's victory is dearer to me than Kamose himself would be if he came with news of our defeat. So continue on your course, may the Merciful Lord watch over you with His care, and may the prayer of my heart and of the tender hearts of those gathered around me, torn as they are between sorrow, fortitude, and hope, preserve you! Know, my lord, that we shall journey to the town of Dabod, close to the borders of our country, in order to be closer to your messengers. Farewell.
Ahmose read the letter and glimpsed the agonizing pain and burning hope that lay behind its lines. The faces that he had left behind in Napata appeared to him: Tetisheri with her thin face crowned with white hair, his grandmother Ahotep with her majesty and sorrow, his mother Setkimus with her gentle-heartedness, and his wife Nefertari with her wide eyes and slender form. He murmured to himself, “Dear God, Tetisheri takes these murderously painful blows with composure and hope and her sorrow never makes her forget the goal to which we aspire. May I always remember her wisdom and take it as an example for my mind and heart!”
11
The fleet set about its task after taking the Herdsmen's fleet captive. It blockaded the city's — western shore, striking terror into the hearts of the inhabitants of the palaces overlooking the Nile, and exchanged arrow fire with the forts on the shore. It did not, however, try to attack those forts, as these were too well-defended and too elevated, given the low level of the Nile during the harvest season. Instead, it contented itself with probing actions and a siege. Ahmose Ebana's heart tugged him toward the town's southern shore, where the fishermen lived and where a tender heart beat with love for him, and he thought that that place might provide a point of entry for him into Thebes. However, the Herdsmen had been more cautious than he expected and had taken the shore from the Egyptians and occupied its extensive area with well-armored guards.
King Ahmose had decided against attacking with massed companies and sent into the field an elite force of trained men sheltered by tall shields. They vied with the defenders of the mighty wall in a war based on technique and precision targeting. The men were tireless in displaying their traditional skill and high efficiency and the war went on in this way for several days without providing a glimpse of the likely outcome or giving a hint of what the end might be. Growing restive, the king said, “We must give the enemy no respite in which to reorganize or rebuild a new force of chariots.” Ahmose then grasped the hilt of his sword and said, “I shall give orders for the resumption of all-out attack. If lives must be lost, then let us offer ourselves, as befits men who have sworn to liberate Egypt from the heavy yoke of its enemy. I shall dispatch my messengers to the governors of the south to urge them to make siege armory and well-armored siege towers.”
The king issued his order to attack and himself supervised the distribution of the archers’ and lancers’ battalions in the wide field, in the form of a center and two wings, putting Commander Mheb on the right wing and Commander Deeb on the left. The Egyptians started to advance in broad waves, and no sooner had one of these caught up — with the one in front than it took its place and immediately engaged in battle the enemy sheltering behind the awe-inspiring — wall. As the day of fighting wore on, the field started to overflow — with the soldiers pressing on the wall of Thebes and the Egyptians started to deal their enemy terrible losses, though they themselves also lost large numbers of men; however, no matter how bad these losses were, they were smaller than those of the first day. The fighting continued in this way for several more days, the number of dead on both sides increasing. The Egyptians’ right wing redoubled its pressure on the enemy until it was able on one occasion to silence one of the numerous defensive positions and destroy all those firing from its openings. Some brave officers seized the opportunity and attacked this position with their troops, setting up an attack ladder and climbing it with a brave force, while the arrows of their companions concealed them like clouds. The Herdsmen noticed the threatened side and rushed to it in large numbers, subjecting the attackers to withering fire until they wiped them out. The king was delighted with this attack, which set an excellent example for his army, and he told those around him, “For the first time since the siege started, one of my soldiers has been killed on the wall of Thebes.”