McDermott, B. 2004. Warfare in ancient Egypt. – Gloucestershire, Sutton Publishing

Abstract

Being interested in the ancient and middle ages warfare and combat, both as a scholar and as a re-enacter, I have read this book with much interest and, to be honest, with a lot of expectations. Most of them have not been deluded, but some have been left quite wanting. In order to understand why, let us take an excursus of this interesting volume.

The book is divided into three parts, each respectively concerning the Old, Middle, and New Kingdom military organisation. Three appendices complete the book (the first about weapons and armours of the Amarna period, the second and third being just lists of military sites and the usual chronology of Egypt).

The first impression by reading the book is that McDermott has done extensive field researches, as the vast majority of the black and white pictures are at the hand of the author. The whole book has only black and white pictures and drawings (made by McDermott as well). Most pictures are clear, but some are not, and there is the occasional misquoting of pictures, or references to pictures that should be numbered differently. For instance, on page 32 there we find figure 26. One normally expects that the next figure is 27, but on the following page we find figure 17; figure 27 has been printed on page 35. This causes a bit of confusion for the reader that finds a reference to figure 17 on page 22, whereas figure 15 is actually printed on this page. One sees figure 16 on the following page, and expects figure 17 to follow, which is, again, not the case. Read more...