Bronze Age Military Equipment

Dan Howard

• Publisher: Pen & Sword Military
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9781848842939
• eBook ISBN: 9781783032839
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: History

"A very valuable piece of work, providing a splendid overview" of the weapons, armor, shields and chariots used in warfare from 3000 BC to 1200 BC (HistoryOfWar.org).
 
This book is a fascinating discussion of the development of the military equipment of the earliest organized armies. Dan Howard describes the development of weapons, armor and chariots, how they were made and their tactical use in battle. Spanning from the introduction of massed infantry by the Sumerians (c. 26th century BC) through to the collapse of the chariot civilizations (c. 12th century BC), this is the period of the epic struggles described in the Old Testament and Homer's Iliad, the clashes of mighty empires like those of the Babylonians, Egyptians and Hittites.
 
In Bronze Age Military Equipment, Howard provides "an able and readable review that is supported in the text by drawings and sketches, but there is also an excellent full color photographic section that shows replica weapons and armor created in bronze" (Firetrench).

Chapter 1

Bronze Age Warfare

‘When did warfare begin?’ This question cannot truly be answered. There are too many assumptions that must be made, including a subjective definition of the term ‘warfare’ and a presupposition that there was a time in mankind’s history when warfare did not exist. Most of the arguments for early warfare are anthropological in nature with scholars making the assumption that human societies went through an ‘evolutionary progression’ from bands of hunter gatherers to either nomadic pastoralists or fixed settlements of farmers, which developed into a city-state that exerts control over the local area. Warfare spread as the wealth and size of permanent settlements increased. Humans began to specialize in certain occupations, such as the ‘warrior’, who formed part of an elite warband that served as the core for raiding parties or homeland defence. Warfare occurred between settlements, but more commonly between a settlement and nomadic pastoralists. It is said that nomads viewed farmers with contempt as ‘plant-eating slaves to their fields’; they were just another resource to be exploited. This methodology works in a general context but is too rigid to be of much practical use, since it is clear from primitive societies in recent times that some tribes resolve disputes through discussion and mediation, some make use of ritualistic contests with little actual bloodshed, while only some resort to violence.

This work avoids the philosophical aspects of the subject and instead uses the general phrase ‘organized violence’ to define warfare. It begins at the period when the weapons found at various Neolithic sites seem to have begun to be modified specifically for use against fellow humans and explores the time period in which organized violence becomes more widespread. This evidence must be examined carefully, though. A single skeleton with weapon trauma may have been executed or murdered, while simultaneous burials of multiple skeletons with weapons damage are more likely to be evidence of warfare. Bows, slings, and spears are equally suited for hunting as for combat so cannot be used on their own to determine whether warfare was practiced. The mace seems an exception that will be discussed in a later chapter (see ‘Weapons’, pp. 23–25). Circumvallation is another good indicator of endemic warfare and will be discussed below (see p. 5).

Edged weapons in the Neolithic period (8500–4500BC) consist of axes, spearheads and arrowheads made of stone such as flint, chert, or obsidian. They were probably used for both hunting and warfare, though the latter is unlikely to have been endemic at this time. The late Neolithic is characterized by self-sufficient, fairly isolated settlements. Warfare was probably limited to raiding parties and minor skirmishes.

Violence seems to have accelerated at the end of the fifth millennium. This is called the Ubaid period (5000–4000 BC) after a shared style of material culture that spread throughout the Middle East. This growing similarity between the material cultures of different regions suggests ongoing social and economic contact. Agriculture spread out to cover more and more of the land and for those who could not retreat; the only alternatives were submission or counter-aggression. There is also evidence of periodic droughts in the region and these may have contributed to social upheaval and increased violence.

Safety in numbers encouraged people to consolidate into larger and larger settlements. Religion thrived and huge temples and monuments were constructed. The end of the Ubaid period sees the transition into the Chalcolithic period where items start to be made from copper and its naturally-occurring alloys (such as arsenic-copper). Societies developed until hundreds of thousands were controlled by a warrior elite ruled by a king. This process first seems to have occurred in ancient Sumer, a group of city-states between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers in what is now Iraq. The Greeks called it Mesopotamia (‘the land between the rivers’). It is in Sumer that the earliest known copper-alloy spearhead was found (dating to c. 4000 BC).

It isn’t until the second half of the fourth millennium, known as Late Uruk period (3500–2900 BC) that large-scale warfare is evident. The development of complex administrative systems helped to manage a city-state, raise and provision standing armies, and keep them in the field for extended campaigns. Surviving iconographical evidence suggests that a similar type of warfare was practiced from Sumeria along the Euphrates and into Syria.¹

The end of the Uruk period introduces the Early Dynastic period (2900–2650BC) which sees Sumeria divided into independent feuding city-states. Violence was used as a tool to maintain the balance of power. Military objectives were limited and campaigns short. William J. Hamblin writes that the scope of fighting was limited to an area of about 300 miles.² The best recorded feud during this time was between the cities of Umma and Lagash, which were only about 25 miles apart. Hamblin notes that the greatest distance of any campaign was between Kish and Elam, no more than 160 miles. Each city fought to give its ruler the title Lugal Kish (‘Headman of Kish’). He was the first among his peers rather than being an absolute ruler. The title carried religious as well as military significance.

The Sumerian tablets of Shuruppak (2600 BC) indicate that during this time the city-states provided for the maintenance of 600–700 full time soldiers. A century later the Stele of Vultures was carved to celebrate the victory of King Eannatum of Lagash over Enakalle of Umma. It portrays the King of Lagash leading a massed formation of helmeted infantry, armed with spears and shields. The king, with a piercing axe, rides a chariot drawn by four onagers (wild asses). Here we see the beginnings of the phalanx that was to dominate the battlefield many centuries later. The phalanx, or shield-wall, was a primitive formation that minimized the limitations of poorly trained conscripts while offering good protection so long as they maintained tight ranks. Battle was over quickly and casualties could be high for the loser. The Stele of Vultures records over 3,000 Ummaite casualties for that particular engagement.

Eventually a military campaign by Sargon the Great (c. 2300 BC) united all of Mesopotamia and provided the world with its first military dictatorship. One account records that his core military force numbered 5,400 men. Sumer became one of the more advanced of the early Bronze Age civilisations, both culturally and militarily. Defences consisted mainly of copper-alloy helmets and large shields. Some argue that metallic helmets proved so effective that they drove the mace from the Bronze Age battlefield.³ The most common weapon was the spear, but some troops would have carried axes or daggers. Vehicles of the time were slow and awkward, being pulled by animals such as onagers rather than horses. It is more likely that they were used for transportation rather than being deployed tactically on the battlefield.

Copper and Bronze

Like gold and silver, copper metal can be found in its natural state and is easy to work. The earliest worked copper objects were polished malachite beads found at Çayönü in Anatolia and dating to the ninth millennium BC. The fashioning of soft metals into small objects like beads and pins is known as ‘trinket metallurgy’ and this is the only kind of metalwork evident until the end of the seventh millennium. The earliest copper weapon ever to have been discovered is a mace head found at the city of Can Hasan in southern Anatolia, and dating to the sixth millennium (see ‘Weapons’, pp. 24–25).

Copper became more plentiful when it was discovered how to smelt it from ores, and easier to work when casting was developed. The earliest evidence for smelting in the Middle East is in Çatal Höyük in Anatolia, dating to the early sixth millennium, but smelting is evident in the Americas and in the Balkans, so it is likely that the technology was developed independently by different peoples. By the end of the fifth millennium in the Middle East, casting and smelting was widespread in Anatolia, Canaan, Iran, Mesopotamia, and Syria. Copper was the most plentiful in Anatolia, Iran and the Levant. Avilova writes that these regions ‘have cupriferous areas rich in native copper and copper ore deposits, both oxidic and sulphide. This contributed substantially to local population’s acquaintance first with native copper and then melting copper of ores. With this development the use of copper expanded dramatically and the earliest independent centres of production and use of metal emerged.’⁴

While copper was plentiful in the above regions it was scarce in Egypt and Mesopotamia. Roaf argues that the need for access to copper mines or copper markets was one of the driving factors behind early imperialism.⁵ If copper couldn’t be peacefully traded then military force was used to secure access. It became a cycle; greater need for metal led to larger armies which, in turn, required more metal to equip.

Copper is a soft metal and doesn’t hold an edge well. Sometimes it is found naturally alloyed with metals such as arsenic, which produce a harder metal, but it was rare to find a naturally-occurring alloy with just the right combination of elements to make a good weapon. The first man-made copper alloy was bronze, a combination of copper and tin. Bronze working seems to have begun at the end of the fourth millennium; the earliest bronze objects were found in Syria dating to this time period. It is the commonly accepted date for the beginning of the Bronze Age, though copper items continued to be widely used.

Avilova studied 658 copper-based objects found in Anatolia.⁶ Forty-two of them were dated to the Chalcolithic period; of these, twenty-six were pure copper, thirteen were copper-arsenic alloy, and one was copper-tin (bronze). Of the above 658 objects, 127 date to the Early Bronze Age. Of these, nineteen were pure copper, ninety-five were copper-arsenic, and ten were copper-tin. The majority of the above 658 items dated to the Middle Bronze Age. There was a total of 498 items, of which sixty-three were pure copper, 250 were copper-arsenic, and 155 were copper-tin. It is apparent how the use of tin as an alloying element increases in frequency as the Bronze Age progresses, but copper and arsenic-copper alloys were still being used.

While both copper and tin can both be found naturally in their metallic form, bronze cannot. It requires a mastery of the skills of melting and alloying of metals. It is unclear how it was first discovered that adding tin to copper produced a superior metal. Van der Heide believes that it might have been the serendipitous result of using tin-laden stones, such as casserite or stannite, to line a copper smelting furnace.⁷ The main source for tin during the Bronze Age was Afghanistan; the Sumerians knew the region as Aratta or Tukrish. Hamblin uses as an example the Middle Bronze Age settlement of Kanesh (Nesha) in Anatolia where surviving records describe shipments of a total of 80 tons of tin to Anatolia over a fifty-year period from Afghanistan through Assyria to Kanesh with a markup of at least 100 percent along the way.⁸ In the 1980s there was a tin mine located in Anatolia in the central Taurus Mountains; the mine was at Kestel and an associated smelter was nearby at Goltepe,⁹ but it would not have supplied enough tin to meet local demand.

Even though copper alloys had been in use before the Bronze Age, Hamblin makes sense when he argues that true Bronze Age warfare begins when bronze is widely distributed to the troops.¹⁰ This doesn’t occur until large supplies of tin are secured in the Middle Bronze Age (2000–1550 BC). Before this period, weapons of stone and natural copper alloys were used alongside bronze ones. During the Middle Bronze Age armies start to be equipped with bronze weapons. Arrowheads seem to have been the last to be made of bronze, and this is likely to have been because of the nature of the weapon. Bronze might have been more widely available during this time, but it was still not cheap enough to put on disposable arrows. At the end of this period even body armour starts to be made of bronze, but it is only available to the elite (see the chapter on ‘Armour’, p. 65).

Circumvallation

Circumvallation is probably the best way to determine when warfare came to a region since it is difficult to imagine a reason why a settlement would construct fortifications if they didn’t feel threatened by violence of some sort. The ancient city of Jericho is the oldest known example of a fortified town with its wall and tower dated to the early seventh millennium. Yigael Yadin records its circular tower as 10m high, 13m in diameter at its base, and 10m in diameter at the top.¹¹ The rock wall was calculated to have been 3m wide and 4m high. But it stands alone as an example of a walled settlement in the region (other settlements of the time were unfortified) and so cannot be used as early evidence for widespread warfare during that period.

It is in Anatolia that we find a group of fortified settlements dating to the fifth-sixth millennium. They include Aşikli Höyük, Çatal Höyük, Hacilar, and Kuruçay Höyük. Aşikli Höyük consisted of a mud brick wall surrounding a settlement of mud-brick houses grouped together in clusters. Like Çatal Höyük, there were no doors in the exterior walls of the buildings, so they must have been accessed by means of ladders, probably through holes in the roof. Çatal Höyük doesn’t have a perimeter wall at all. The houses are all joined together, sharing common walls, with no doors between them. The outer walls of the outermost houses form a continuous defensive barrier. Access is gained via ladders to holes in the roof. A single fortified gate allows entry to the complex from outside.

The original settlement of Hacilar was not protected by a wall at all and was razed around 5500 BC. It was rebuilt with a stone wall between 1.5m and 3m thick. It was razed again in c. 5250 BC and rebuilt with a stronger fortification, and razed a final time in c. 4800 BC, when it was abandoned. Kuruçay Höyük was settled for a period of about five thousand years between the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age with thirteen layers of habitation during that time. Its defences we...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Illustrations
• List of Plates
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 - Bronze Age Warfare
• Chapter 2 - Weapons
• Chapter 3 - Chariots
• Chapter 4 - Armour
• Chapter 5 - Shields
• Appendix 1 - Homeric Shields
• Appendix 2 - Homeric Armour
• Appendix 3 - Warriors of the Bronze Age
• Appendix 4 - Typology of Bronze Age Swords
• Notes
• Select Bibliography
• Index