The metallurgic proficiency of Old Egypt would lead to the development
of arms and armour, and enable the soldier to win easier victories
over the ‘vile, impure, and miserable Gentiles’—i.e. all men except
themselves. The god Anhar, or Shu, is ‘Lord of the Scymitar.’ Horus,
as a hawk-headed mummied deity, is seated holding two Swords. Amen-Ra,
Lord of Hab, is a ‘great god Ramenma, “Lord of the Sword.”’ The
‘wearer of the Pshent or double crown’ (the Pharaoh), the image of
Monthu, god of war, was _ex-officio_ ‘His Holiness’ (high-priest) and
Commander-in-Chief, who personally led his warriors to ‘wash their
hearts’ (cool their valours) as the Zulus wash their spears. Like
Horus, he is ‘valiant with the Sword.’[491] When going to war he was
presented with the ‘Falchion of Victory,’ and thus addressed: ‘Take
this weapon, and smite with it the heads of the unclean.’ In paintings
and sculptures he is a large and heroic figure: he draws the bow, he
spears or cuts down the foe, and he drives his war-car over the bodies
of the slain. His soldiers are divided into Calasiri (Krashr[492] or
bowmen) and Hermotybians, the latter unsatisfactorily derived[493] from
ἡμιτύβιον, a strong linen (waist-?) cloth. The two divisions represent
the second of the five castes, ranking below the priestly and above
the agricultural: they held one of the three portions into which the
land was divided. Recruits were taught in the military schools that
originated the Pentathlon and the Pancratium, the Palæstra and the
Gymnasium. They were carefully trained to gymnastics, as the monumental
pictures in the Beni Hasan tombs show; they used Mogdars or Indian
clubs, and they excelled in wrestling, though not in boxing. The royal
statues are those of athletes, with their broad shoulders, thin flanks
and well-developed muscles. The soldier practised single-stick, the
right hand being apparently protected by a basket-guard, and the left
forearm shielded by a splint or splints of wood, strapped on, and
serving for a shield (fig. 152).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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