Propaganda victory for Ramses II | Battle of Kadesh
The battle of Kadesh, sometimes called the first world war, featured one of the largest-ever chariot battles. It was fought in 1275 B.C.E. in present-day Syria between the Egyptians under Pharaoh Ramses II, and the Hittites under King Muwatalli II, who were supported by eighteen of their allied and vassal states.
The invasion by Ramses II sought to wrest Syria from the Hittites and recapture the Hittite-held city of Kadesh. Ramses II led his forces into an ambush by 2,500 Hittite chariots, lured by Hittite spies who gave false information to their Egyptian captors.
The battle may be the earliest military action recorded in detail, mostly from Egyptian sources, which proclaimed the siege a great victory for Ramses II. Some historians disagree and proclaim the encounter a Hittite victory because Ramses failed to achieve his military objective.
Although a military failure, Kadesh was a propaganda victory for Ramesses, and he displayed this "victory" prominently on the walls of several temples throughout Egypt.
The Karnak Hypostyle Hall was intended as one of the venues for his Kadesh narrative of texts and war scenes, but before work was finished, pharaoh changed his mind and had scenes of his later wars in Syria and Palestine carved over top of the incomplete Kadesh scenes.
The reliefs are obviously composed from an Egyptian perspective, glorifying pharaoh Ramesses II, and proclaim victory though the battle likely ended in a draw. The battle is documented in two primary accounts known as the Poem and the Bulletin, both of which are supplemented by pictorial reliefs depicting scenes from the battle with explanatory captions close-by. In the Ramesses II temples at Abu Simbel, Abydos, Luxor, Karnak, and the Ramesseum, the Bulletin appears seven times and the Poem eight times. The texts are not identical, some parts were omitted at the various temples due space constraints.