217 BC – During the Wars of the Diadochi at the Battle
of Raphia, Ptolemy IV Philopator of Egypt with 70,000 infantry, 5,000 cavalry,
and 73 war elephants fought the army of Antiochus III. The Antiochids suffered
just under 10,000 foot dead, about 300 horse and 5 elephants; 4,000 men were
taken prisoner. The Ptolemaic losses were 1,500 foot, 700 horse and 16
elephants. Most of the Antiochid elephants were taken by the Ptolemies.
The soldiers in the howdahs maintained a brilliant fight,
lunging at and striking each other with crossed pikes. But the elephants
themselves fought still more brilliantly, using all their strength in the
encounter, and pushing against each other, forehead to forehead.
Polybios, 5.84
The Campaign
Despite the fact that Seleukos I owed his kingdom to the
extraordinary generosity of Ptolemy I, a disputed division of spoils after the
Battle of Ipsos erased any feelings of goodwill between the two leaders. The heart
of the problem was the allotment of Koile Syria to Seleukos instead of Ptolemy
during the apportionment of the Antigonid Empire. Ptolemy, who had worked to
capture Antigonid possessions in Syria in the weeks prior to the battle, was
tricked by Antigonos into retreating to Egypt, thereby missing the decisive
confrontation at Ipsos. Subsequently, when the victors met and Seleukos was
rewarded for his efforts in the battle with the province of Syria, a resentful
Ptolemy indignantly refused to withdraw his garrisons and vacate the territory.
Unwilling to press the issue at that time, Seleukos nevertheless laid the
groundwork for future conflicts by not relinquishing the Seleukid claim to the
region.
What followed, under less-tolerant leaders, was a century of
simmering resentment and outright hostility during which no fewer than three
wars were waged to resolve the question of which power would control the rich
Syrian coastlands. Often spilling over into Asia Minor, the Kyklades and
Europe, these conflicts frequently drew other regional powers into the struggle
with a chaotic web of shifting alliances as well as military and economic
support that did much to shape the bloody history of the eastern Mediterranean.
As the third century waned, however, a new generation of kings came to power in
Macedon, Egypt and Asia and a new age, the beginning of the end of the
Hellenistic world, began to unfold.
The clearest dividing line between the age of Macedonian
dominance and decline can be found in the last quarter of the third century.
With the accession of Antiochos III to the Seleukid throne in 223 and Philip V
and Ptolemy IV to the thrones of Macedon and Egypt just months apart in 221,
the governance of the three great monarchies of the day passed to three very young
and largely-untested kings. The successes and failures of these rulers would
prove decisive in the coming struggle for the survival of the Hellenistic
world.
After decades of warfare waged by Ptolemaic pharaohs and
Seleukid kings for the control of Syria, the newly-crowned Antiochos III
decided to settle the issue once and for all. Despite the fact that he had
inherited a realm riddled with internal problems, including smouldering
rebellions at both ends of his massive empire, Antiochos sought first to seize
control of Syria. By snatching this prize from an already militarily weak
Ptolemaic empire, Antiochos could further cripple his adversaries while laying
the groundwork for an eventual invasion of Egypt itself.
Having dispatched his top commander to the east with a large
army to deal with a rebellious general, a subsequent shortage of battle-ready
troops led Antiochos to advance on Ptolemaic Syria with only a modest-sized
force. Nevertheless, marching boldly into the region in the summer of 221, the young
king moved swiftly to try to catch his enemy off guard. His efforts were all in
vain, however, as Ptolemy’s commander in the province, an Aitolian general
named Theodotos, had been alerted beforehand to the Seleukid king’s designs and
was able to erect defences and stoutly garrison many of the region’s
strongholds. Unprepared for Theodotos’ spirited defence and unable, due to the
relatively small size of his force, to strategically pin and flank the
Ptolemaic positions, Antiochos eventually withdrew with some loss after a
series of reverses.
Having learned that the forces he sent east had been
defeated, Antiochos decided to secure his rear before again attempting to
subdue Syria. Taking command of the army himself, in early 220 Antiochos set
off toward Mesopotamia, where he met the rebels in battle. Decisively defeating
them and restoring the region to Seleukid control, he then turned his attention
back to the Mediterranean coast, where he seized the important port city of
Seleukia in the spring of 219. As the campaigning season rolled on and
Antiochos prepared his men for a further advance, an unexpected piece of good
fortune energized the king’s plans. Theodotos, alienated by the short-sighted
politics of the Egyptian court, decided that his future was brighter in the
Seleukid camp. He consequently sent word to Antiochos that he was prepared to
surrender his charge, an offer which the young king accepted with delight.
Advancing confidently southward, Antiochos was able to
occupy much of Syria, though some fortresses and cities remained obstinately
loyal to Ptolemy. Instead of barrelling on toward Egypt, however, Antiochos
decided to place the holdouts under siege in order to consolidate his control
of the region. While this was going on the pharaoh and his ministers were
scrambling to mitigate the disastrous effects of Theodotos’ betrayal. Having
depended almost entirely on that general and his forces to hold the Syrian
frontier, the leaders in Alexandria were now forced to take action to remedy a
deadly situation that had been developing unchecked for some years. With their
military strength centred chiefly on their powerful fleet, the Ptolemaic
government had over the years allowed their standing army to fall into such
disrepair that it was no longer a match for the veteran forces of Antiochos.
Desperate measures were now hastily put into place to recruit and train
thousands of troops to bolster the small, but effective, European core of the
royal army. In an attempt to match the experience and sheer number of men that
the Seleukid king could muster, recruiting officers were dispatched throughout
the eastern Mediterranean with plenty of that quintessentially Ptolemaic
problem-solver: gold.
To buy themselves some much-needed time for these measures
to take effect, the Egyptians approached Antiochos at the end of 219 with a
proposal for a four-month ceasefire. Unexpectedly, Antiochos agreed, probably
with the hope of bargaining from a position of strength and gaining all of
Syria without a fight. The Egyptians, however, strung the Seleukid monarch
along, using the time to frantically train and equip soldiers and contract
mercenaries, even going so far as to throw open their recruitment to native
Egyptians. After negotiations broke down over the winter, Antiochos resumed his
war in the spring of 218, though he spent the majority of the year pacifying
the remaining strongholds of Ptolemaic resistance in southern Syria.
Meanwhile, Ptolemy’s hurried campaign of improvement and
enrolment had been massively successful, supplying the pharaoh with a powerful
army of adequately trained soldiers. Led by some of the most experienced
officers he could recruit from throughout the Greek world, by the early summer
of 217 Ptolemy was finally prepared to take the fight to Antiochos. While the
Seleukid king moved his men through Koile Syria, stamping out the last remnants
of Ptolemaic resistance, he received the jarring news that Ptolemy had taken
the field with a monstrous force and was advancing with unexpected vigour
northward out of Egypt. Gathering together every available man, Antiochos
marched without delay to meet his foe; eventually finding him encamped along
the main north-south highway near Raphia in southern Syria. There the pharaoh
sat, defiantly barring the way south and directly challenging Antiochos, whose
claims on Ptolemaic Syria were about to be put to the ultimate test.
The Battlefield
The battlefield of Raphia, like so many battlefields of
antiquity, was located on or near a major regional highway. A vital goal of
Ptolemy’s campaign was to occupy this route, as it not only facilitated the
rapid movement of thousands of troops but also directly linked the largest and
most important cities of the area. Sitting astride the road, which led to the
Egyptian fortress-city of Pelusium, Ptolemy arranged his forces so as to block
the plain and prevent Antiochos from any further advance.
Though there is little mention of any obstacles or
significant geographic features in Polybios’ account of the battle, it has been
suggested that rising dunes and drifting sands may have flanked the
battlefield, then as today. This would have placed a definite limit on the
space available for cavalry manoeuvres, though from Polybios’ text, the
battlefield seems to have been an open desert plain near the sea coast.
Armies and Leaders
On 22 June 217, the armies of the Seleukid king, Antiochos
III, and the Ptolemaic pharaoh, Ptolemy IV, collided in a death struggle at
Raphia in southern Syria. With almost 150,000 soldiers taking part in the conflict,
not to mention some 175 elephants, Raphia would become one of the largest
battles of the pre-modern era. Just as important as the size of the engagement,
however, was the composition of the armies involved.
In the century since their creation, the kingdoms arising
from the eastern regions of Alexander’s empire were forced by their distance
from the manpower reserves of Europe to compromise in the construction of their
armies. Rather than rely solely on their relatively few Macedonian phalangites,
they instead made extensive use of conquered peoples. The Seleukids especially
found that an abundance of missile and light-armed troops conscripted from the
provinces of the former Persian Empire typically afforded their phalanx greater
protection and flexibility. The unique battlefield expertise of the different
troop types which Hellenistic leaders were able to recruit was proven time and
again to be invaluable. While this shift toward lighter native troops had
tactical implications on the battlefield, the large-scale conscription of
natives from across the broad Seleukid and Ptolemaic spheres of influence
presented a different kind of challenge for commanders. An idea of the
difficulties of manoeuvring these multinational forces can be found in the inspirational
pre-battle speech given to the troops by both Ptolemy and Antiochos, which had
to be relayed to each of the various nationalities through numerous different
interpreters and translators.
Despite such easy access to large numbers of native infantry,
virtually all eastern Hellenistic leaders shared a preoccupation with the
judicial utilization of any Greek and Macedonian settlers they could attract or
who had previously settled in the region. Known as klerouchoi, or military
settlers, these men traded military service for land and as a result were
soldiers of varying quality, especially in Ptolemaic Egypt. Apart from these
dilettantes, only a comparatively small group of professional soldiers formed
the core of either of the great armies that clashed at Raphia. Nevertheless,
the phalanx remained a crucial element of Hellenistic warfare in the east,
despite the increasingly non-professional character of its soldiers.
For several days the two forces camped some 5.5 miles apart
while intelligence and supplies were gathered, until Antiochos abruptly decided
to escalate matters. Seizing a chance to place his army in a more favourable
position, he thrust his men forward to within a half mile of Ptolemy’s camp.
From this dangerously close vantage point each force warily eyed the other as
skirmishing and raiding ensured that the situation remained tense. Such a
stand-off could not last forever, especially as the supplies of both sides
began to dwindle. It therefore came as no surprise to Antiochos when his officers
informed him one morning of movement in front of the Ptolemaic camp. By the
time the king was himself able to get a look at the suspicious activity it was
clear that Ptolemy was drawing his men up for battle. Antiochos quickly ordered
his men to do likewise.
Deploying across the entire breadth of the plain, the kings
spent the early morning hours of 22 June positioning their forces for maximum
effect. As the first to deploy, Ptolemy was confident in his men, and for good
reason. Thanks to the industry of his ministers and officers, the pharaoh
arrived at the battlefield with some 70,000 infantry, 5,000 cavalry and 73
elephants. Confident but not rash, Ptolemy knew he would need every man in his
gargantuan army in order to secure victory against the more experienced and
highly-trained troops of his foe.
Forming the extreme left of his line from 3,000 Libyan,
Egyptian and royal guard cavalry, Ptolemy took up position there, opposite
Antiochos. He then extended his line to the right by placing a force of 3,000
infantry known as the Royal Guard, followed by 2,000 peltasts adjoining a unit
of Libyans trained as phalangites. Following the time-honoured tradition in
Macedonian armies, Ptolemy placed his phalanx, a powerful block of 45,000
phalangites, in the centre of his line. Staggering in its size, the Ptolemaic
phalanx was unfortunately not the uniform fighting force it may have seemed.
While the mainstay of his entire line was a phalanx of 25,000 Macedonian and
Greek military settlers or mercenaries of adequate quality, the remaining
20,000 soldiers were a hastily-assembled and unpredictable force of native
Egyptians, as yet untested in battle. Though by no means untrained, these
troops lacked the experience of the mercenaries and the immediate warlike
tradition of the settlers.
The right wing of the Ptolemaic army, under the command of
the Thessalian mercenary officer Echekrates, was composed of 8,000 Greek
mercenaries adjoining 6,000 Gallic and Thracian soldiers. On the extreme right
end of the line was a superbly-trained force of 2,000 Greek and mercenary
cavalry. To secure his flanks, Ptolemy strung 40 elephants across the front of
his left wing, supported by 2,000 Cretan archers. His remaining 33 animals he
placed in front of the cavalry on his right wing.
Across the field, Antiochos’ deployment mimicked Ptolemy’s
in certain key ways. Taking up position amongst the right-wing cavalry,
directly facing the Egyptian monarch, Antiochos placed 2,000 cavalry at the
extreme end of his line flanked by an advance force of another 2,000 horsemen
positioned at an angle to his own unit. To the left of these he placed a band
of Greek mercenaries adjoining another unit of European mercenaries trained in
the Macedonian fashion. In his centre the Seleukid king positioned his most
dependable soldiers, a 10,000-man-strong unit of phalangites known as the
Silver Shields. Next to these were stationed a phalanx of 20,000 military
settlers.
On his left wing Antiochos was forced to extend his line,
placing many light units and even missile troops along his front. Adjoining the
klerouchoi phalanx was a motley collection of 10,000 Arab light infantry,
followed by a further assemblage of 5,000 light-armed troops from the eastern
provinces. Filling out the rest of the front were several thousand missile
troops before the line was finally capped by a force of 2,000 cavalry. Like
Ptolemy, Antiochos placed his elephants across his wings, with 60 animals
supported by 2,500 Cretans covering his right, while the remaining 42 screened part
of his left.
All told, the combatants’ dispositions at the outset of the
Battle of Raphia were fairly well-matched. Though Ptolemy comfortably
outnumbered Antiochos in phalanx infantry, almost half of those troops were the
Egyptian phalangites, a thoroughly unknown commodity. Despite this somewhat
tenuous advantage in heavy foot, Antiochos retained a slim superiority in
cavalry and a large one in elephants, outnumbering Ptolemy’s beasts 102 to 73.
As the struggle began on that sweltering afternoon in late June 217, success or
failure rested entirely with the two young kings who now stood poised to launch
the largest battle between Hellenistic monarchs since the great confrontation
at Ipsos more than eighty years earlier.
