No Frames Ramses' Great Horses: Excerpts from Pharaohs, Fellahs, and Explorers by Amelia B. Edwards
Title page Setting Out The Battle After the Battle At Camp Nile Muse home

Rameses Great Horses
At Camp - by Amelia B. Edwards
THE CAMP OF RAMESES II AT SHABTUN.
The rectangular space enclosed on three sides by a row of shields represents the royal camp.
 To the left, the horses of the charioteers are feeding in mangers and attended by grooms. Bags of fodder lie on the ground. A blacksmith with his brazier prepares to shoe a horse near the middle of the camp.
The oblong structure to the right of the centre is the pavilion of Rameses; five attendants kneel before the entrance to an inner apartment, surmounted by a royal oval watched over by winged genii. This represents the sleeping-place of the king. The pavilion appears to be a movable structure raised on arches; it was probably of wood, and was constructed in such wise as to be easily taken to pieces and put together again.
Elsewhere we see
  • charioteers dragging away empty chariots,
  • a soldier mending a hoe,
  • a man carrying a pair of water-buckets suspended at each end of a pole across his shoulders;
  • infantry and charioteers arriving in camp;
  • soldiers squatting round a bowl at their supper;
  • officers chastising lazy or recalcitrant subordinates, and the like.
Close above and behind the royal pavilion there is a brawl among the king's officers, one of whom is in the act of being stabbed. Just below this group a horse prepares to lie down, bending its fore-legs with a remarkably natural action; while in the foreground to the right, we see the two Syrian spies being soundly bastinadoed, in order to force the truth from them.
All the busy life of a great camp is depicted in this wonderful section of the largest battle-subject in the history of art.

Thank you Amelia B. Edwards May she live (eternally)
Pharaohs, Fellahs, and Explorers
Harper & Brothers, N,Y, 1891.

Title page Setting Out The Battle The Battle At Camp Nile Muse home
Ramses' Great Horses: Excerpts from Pharaohs, Fellahs, and Explorers by Amelia B. Edwards

 
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