Ramses II

Ramses II (reigned 1290-1224 bc), ancient Egyptian king, third ruler of the 19th Dynasty, the son of Seti I. Building on the successes of his father, Ramses attempted to regain and establish control over territory in western Asia that Egypt had held during the 16th and 15th centuries bc. His 67-year reign was one of the longest in Egyptian history and he passed into the popular imagination as the model of an Egyptian pharaoh (king), an outstanding ruler with a semidivine nature, a courageous warrior, and a great builder. Numerous monuments, inscriptions, and papyri testify to the extraordinary dynamism of his personality and provide more documentary evidence for this period than for any other in ancient Egyptian history. See also Ancient Egypt.

As a boy Ramses served as co-ruler with his father and gained early experience of warfare on campaigns with him in Libya and Nubia (now southern Egypt and northern Sudan). After Seti’s death Ramses established his capital at Pi-Ramesse (House of Ramses), a harbor town on the eastern delta of the Nile that was the site of a former Hyksos stronghold. From here Ramses launched expeditions to subdue rebellious Egyptian territories in Syria, including a foray into northern Palestine during the fourth year of his reign.

Ramses II’s principal opponents were the Hittites, then the leading power of Asia Minor, against whom he waged a long war. In the fifth year of his reign Ramses led an invasion into the Hittite empire, when he and his army crossed into northern Syria as far as the Hittite stronghold of Kadesh. Believing the city to be lightly guarded, Ramses advanced with a division of his troops, only to find himself quickly surrounded by a Hittite army and cut off from the bulk of his forces. In the battle that followed, Ramses claimed to have fought Hittite warriors single-handedly until reinforcements finally arrived and the enemy was defeated. Although Ramses later boasted of a glorious triumph, he had nearly lost the battle, his troops had failed to take the city, and the Egyptians afterwards had to retreat. The battle was later commemorated on many of his greatest monuments as a resounding victory.

Neither power achieved a conclusive victory at Kadesh, and Ramses continued to raid towns on the Hittite frontier until the ninth or tenth year of his reign, when he took Katna and Tunip. Having failed to make significant territorial gains, however, he began to adopt a more conciliatory policy. Fifteen years after the Battle at Kadesh, Ramses signed a treaty with the Hittites, the first recorded treaty in history. It divided the disputed lands between the two kingdoms and provided for Ramses to marry the daughter of the Hittite king.

The remaining years of Ramses II’s long rule were comparatively peaceful. He became one of the greatest of Egyptian builders and adorned nearly every city in the land with a temple. He built a magnificent new capital on the Nile Delta; he also built temples on the sites of monuments of his predecessors. He completed a vast hypostyle (large-columned) hall in the Temple of Amon at Karnak and temples at Abydos and Luxor. At Thebes he built his mortuary temple, a memorial known as the Ramesseum. His great temple at Abū Simbel in Nubia, which features four colossal figures of the king, was carved into a sandstone cliff near the town of Aswān on the Nile. During the 1960s the temple was reconstructed on a higher site to save it from flooding following the construction of the Aswān High Dam.

Ramses II fathered more than 100 children with his numerous wives and concubines. The names of many of them were inscribed on official monuments. He outlived his 12 eldest sons and was succeeded on his death by the 13th eldest, Merenptah.