Dr. Campbell Price

So that's where Kadesh is.

And there are clearly...

Yeah, he's fighting against the Hittites and there are various changes in leadership.

So there does come a point in the 20s, Regnald years 20 and up, where maybe he's a little bit older and maybe he's thinking, I don't want to keep going back.

And that is when you get a more decisive treaty and you get a sense that other states in the ancient Levant are more used to compromise, whereas the Egyptians want all or nothing.

Maybe that's just the nature of what's recorded, or maybe that's actually the social reality, the political reality in other parts of the world.

But in Egypt, they accept a peace treaty which is sealed by a marriage, a diplomatic marriage.

And this is fascinating because we do have an insight into the exchanges between the royal courts.

And so you have Ramses II, who is a very wealthy man,

individual who's commissioning all these temples and statues and is really you know is one of the great rulers of the ancient world pleading with not pleading but kind of pleading pleading poverty and saying he wants the dowry of the incoming bride to be more than what is being offered and so it seems that the bride's mother the queen mother essentially

is pushing the hard bargaining.

So we shouldn't just imagine these conflicts are played out in the battlefield.

Yes, they are, and there are repeated attempts to secure Kadesh.

But latterly, maybe when the fight, the fire leaves Ramesses, he is more content to seal things with a diplomatic marriage.

And that is a one-sided thing because the king of Egypt would never give a daughter of his own.

An Egyptian princess is never sent to a non-Egyptian court, but it is acceptable for a non-Egyptian princess with a hefty dowry to come to Egypt.

And that is considered a victory.

Yeah, let's just call it a draw and we'll be mutually beneficial.

I think what actually happens in terms of on the ground, you know, we're talking about relatively small areas of land.

There must be a kind of, the Egyptians think they secure some assurance of loyalty and then they leave and then sides are switched and it's like this Punch and Judy show.