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00:00A civilization immortalized by awe-inspiring monuments and priceless treasures, ruled by pharaohs, living gods, and legendary warriors.
00:14But their wealth masks a darker truth. Power was bought with blood.
00:25They assembled the greatest armies in history.
00:30Revolutionized the art of warfare, and waged spectacular battles, and titanic conquests.
00:43This is the hidden face of Egyptian history. The story of the pharaohs at war.
00:49The spirit of the pharaohs at war, and the rocket's death, and the terror of the pharaohs, and the terror of the pharaohs, and the terror of the pharaohs.
01:05June 22nd, 217 BCE, 20 kilometers south of Gaza, on the sand, blood is about to flow.
01:20This desert land would become the scene of one of the greatest battles of antiquity,
01:25the Battle of Raffia.
01:28Two sworn enemies are about to clash.
01:31On one side, Pharaoh Ptolemy IV, ruler of the Lajid Dynasty that reigns over Egypt.
01:38With 70,000 soldiers, 5,000 horsemen and 73 war elephants poised to fight.
01:48On the other, Antiochus III, nicknamed Antiochus the Great, ruler of the immense Seleucid Empire.
01:56With 62,000 soldiers, 6,000 horsemen and 102 war elephants.
02:05The forces involved are extraordinary.
02:08The value of the two enemies' armies are as high as the stakes of the battle.
02:15Antiochus, Pharaoh Ptolemy's number one enemy, posed a direct threat to Egypt's survival.
02:26Ptolemy and Antiochus were the heirs of Alexander the Great.
02:30A century earlier, their great-grandfathers, Generals Ptolemy I and Seleucus I fought alongside
02:38him.
02:39Together, they forged one of the greatest empires in history.
02:43When Alexander the Great died, they shared his empire.
02:48Two immense and powerful forces emerged.
02:52The Lajid Empire, which controlled a large part of the Mediterranean.
02:56And the Seleucid Empire, which extended from modern-day Turkey to Central Asia.
03:01But the brothers-in-arms soon became enemies.
03:05Their descendants continued to clash.
03:08And Ptolemy IV and Antiochus III thirsted for revenge.
03:13At the heart of the conflict, West Asia.
03:17For thousands of years, Coelcyria was highly coveted.
03:22Coelcyria was a very rich region, essential for Egypt.
03:31Because it had numerous raw materials that the Ptolemies lacked, such as wood.
03:40The stakes are also commercial.
03:42Raphael lies on the route for spices, myrrh, and incense.
03:47The area of Raphael was incredibly important to be able to trade all the resources that
03:56came from Petra and the East towards the Mediterranean Sea.
04:01If Ptolemy loses the battle, he loses his economic resources and likely the means to pay his army,
04:10and the Ptolemaic Empire will collapse.
04:13The threat was not just to the economy of Ptolemaic Egypt.
04:17Most importantly, the pharaoh's lands had to be protected.
04:21For Ptolemy IV, Egypt's defense was at stake.
04:25The area of Raphael was incredibly important, considering that it was just a corridor that led to Sinai and Egypt afterwards.
04:35Around 400 kilometers separate Raphael from the capital of Pharaoh Ptolemy, Alexandria.
04:43The Sinai is a strategic territory.
04:46It is the gateway to Egypt.
04:49If Antiochus succeeded, he could threaten Egyptian territory and the Ptolemaic dynasty.
04:56In the event of victory, Antiochus III would unite the two greatest Hellenistic empires, the Seleucid and the Ptolemaic.
05:07He'd find himself head of the greatest power in the world, so the stakes are colossal.
05:14Faced with Antiochus III, Pharaoh Ptolemy IV was gambling the survival of his young dynasty.
05:21He must draw on the strengths of the Egyptian empire if he wants to become his own legend.
05:27In Raphael, two brothers face each other as enemies, heirs of the same military traditions.
05:33Since Ptolemy I, the Egyptian army was transformed into something new.
05:40The Lajid army, that of the Ptolemies, was not an Egyptian-style army but a Macedonian-style army.
05:49They adopted the same formation as Alexander the Great's army.
05:53The Macedonian phalanx had proved extremely efficient in fighting and in gaining success.
06:03Alexander the Great used it very efficiently in his own war all over the world.
06:09The Macedonian phalanx dominated the battlefields of the Mediterranean and West Asia for more than two centuries.
06:22In the phalanx formation, the heavily equipped soldiers are organized in very close ranks, armed with large spears called cerises.
06:31They form an impenetrable wall and perform perfectly coordinated movements.
06:36The aim? To annihilate the enemy with a massive frontal assault.
06:41These phalanxes form the central core of both armies.
06:46At Raphael, Ptolemy brought together 25,000 phalangites.
06:51Antiochus' camp had 20,000.
06:54Two armored walls stood on the battlefield.
06:58Vincent Torres-Hougon practises experimental archaeology.
07:03He dons the armor and weaponry of Hellenistic soldiers in order to study them.
07:09The phalangite's weapon of choice is the sarissa.
07:14When primed, the sarissa four will hold the sarissa in both hands and protect themselves with a pelt, protecting them from head to toe.
07:25Phalangites make all the difference on the battlefield.
07:32This sarissa had a spike.
07:35The spike is needed to dig into the ground in the event of a cavalry charge.
07:40The phalangite will be able to withstand a cavalry charge without problem.
07:46The sarissa is securely fixed and supported by fins.
07:49This weapon is about to evolve beyond recognition.
07:54Initially, Alexander's and his father's army had shorter sarissas.
08:00But when his father died, the Greeks and the Macedonians started fighting amongst themselves, which led to a longer sarissa.
08:08He can touch me, but I cannot touch him. So what can I do?
08:15I'm going to make my weapon longer so that I can reach him.
08:19And if possible, I'll make an even longer sarissa so that I'm out of range, but I can touch him.
08:25A competition that reached new heights at the time of Ptolemy IV and Antiochus III.
08:37At Raffia, the spears were almost seven meters. It's like adding this spear onto this one.
08:44The Battle of Raffia was a battle of superlatives, a battle of military genius that pushed all limits.
08:51Never before has a pharaoh assembled such a large army.
08:56A tour de force, made possible by the immeasurable legacy of the Ptolemies,
09:03and the dominant position they established in the ancient world.
09:07The dynasty of the Ptolemaic pharaohs stood out from all the others that had ruled Egypt before.
09:17They set up their capital in Alexandria, the city founded by Alexander the Great.
09:24The Ptolemies transformed the city into a center of learning.
09:29It became the largest city in the world, where the two most powerful civilizations of the times met.
09:36The Ptolemies were both Greek rulers, as to Alexander the Great, and true Egyptian pharaohs.
09:45They had a dual identity.
09:53Ptolemy IV was the great-grandson of the founder of this Greek-Egyptian dynasty.
09:58His ascension to the throne was a bloodbath.
10:03When Ptolemy IV accesses his throne, he is quite young.
10:07His advisor, Sosibius, takes advantage of his youth.
10:12Sosibius wanted to take advantage of the king's youth to rule Egypt.
10:18He wanted to clear the air around him.
10:23He had Ptolemy IV's mother, uncle, and his younger brother killed.
10:29As a result, there was no other competition.
10:33He ensures that he has full control of the young king.
10:38In this family massacre, only his sister Arsenault was spared.
10:50Ptolemy needed her to legitimize his power.
10:53Traditionally, pharaohs ruled in pairs.
10:57The concept of a king and queen is not very common in Greece.
11:01It's mostly men predominant.
11:03You know, the king of Ithaca, the king of Troy, the king of whatever.
11:07But in Egypt, kings and queens are alike.
11:10So the Ptolemies went all the way through applying this method to keep the Egyptians happy
11:17and to avoid any riots or any instability.
11:21In Ptolemaic tradition, it is customary for a brother and a sister to get married, to be wed.
11:30This tradition of brother and sister king and queen duo comes from the tradition of Isis and Osiris,
11:38the gods of the beginning of times in Egypt.
11:43Ptolemy IV married Arsenault III and became a living god and king with the goddess queen by his side.
11:52A new incestuous royal and divine couple reigned over Egypt.
12:03But the Ptolemies did not originate from Egypt.
12:06To rule Egypt, it's not enough to be king.
12:11You have to be Pharaoh.
12:14When the Ptolemies took control of Egypt, it had been 700 years since any large-scale construction programs.
12:21Under the Lajid dynasty, Egyptian rituals were to be enhanced and renewed.
12:28The Ptolemies wanted to reign over the whole of Egypt.
12:32To gain control, they were going to rewrite the rules that had ensured the omnipotence of the pharaohs for 2,000 years.
12:41One of the roles of the ancient Egyptian kings was to be a builder.
12:46They had to build temples for the gods.
12:54Ptolemy IV, in turn, demonstrated his power.
12:57He completed the construction of the Temple of Edfu, dedicated to Horus, warrior and god of the sky.
13:05Identifiable by his falcon head, he was the protector of Egyptian royalty and their avenger.
13:16The great pharaohs of antiquity used their spoils of war to promote their military exploits.
13:21Ptolemy IV also recorded his warrior legend in stone.
13:29One exceptional stela has survived.
13:32It tells the story of the Battle of Raffia.
13:35It's a bilingual document inscribed in both Greek and Egyptian.
13:43We even have two Egyptian versions.
13:46One in hieroglyphics here.
13:49And then, on the back, the language spoken at the time.
13:56On the sides is the Greek translation.
13:59This stone is exceptionally rare and precious for Egypt, because it allows Egyptologists to compare these three languages.
14:10It's the same for the famous Rosetta stone, which enabled Champollion to translate the hieroglyphs.
14:17On this stela, Ptolemy IV occupies the function of a great pharaoh, a warlord, who protects Egypt from chaos.
14:25He was responsible for maintaining a just order, known as the Mahat.
14:32This is the order willed by the gods.
14:37And here the creator god is represented.
14:41It is the god Atom, who hands a victory sword to the pharaoh, who is his earthly representative,
14:48and who ensures Mahat is upheld by striking down Egypt's enemies.
14:52Ptolemy is also represented as the heir to Alexander the Great.
14:59Alexander was often depicted on his horse, Bucephalus.
15:03He's brandishing the Macedonian spear, the saris, and impales a kneeling enemy.
15:11So we have a dual representation.
15:13This is a Greco-Egyptian pharaoh.
15:15To keep their enemies at bay, the Ptolemies established an unprecedented new system in Egypt,
15:28which both ensured their security and increased their prosperity.
15:33At its core, the Lajid army comprised of the phalanx, some horsemen and clerics.
15:39These clerics were descendants of Greeks and Macedonians who had emigrated to Egypt, attracted by Ptolemy's promise.
15:51They were given land in exchange for joining the armed ranks in the event of war.
15:56It's a way of paying them and securing their loyalty as they came from all over the Greek world.
16:05And even further afield, from Thrace and Asia Minor, they came to settle in Egypt.
16:11They were colonial soldiers.
16:12The Ptolemies considered themselves fully Egyptian and protected the freedom and rights of Egyptian people.
16:22So it was inconceivable to expropriate Egyptian subjects to give these territories to Greek colonists.
16:28Other land had to be found.
16:34The Ptolemies were to exploit a region that had been neglected by the great dynasties, the Phaeum.
16:40They dug, channeled and irrigated it, making an immense desert territory fertile.
16:52The clerics trained in the Macedonian phalanx.
16:56At Raphia, tens of thousands responded to the call of Pharaoh Ptolemy IV.
17:00As well as the clash between phalanxes, the armies of Ptolemy and Antiochus were preparing for a much heavier cavalry clash.
17:16A fearsome, frightening confrontation between two battalions of war elephants.
17:21What's special about the Battle of Raphia is that it's the biggest elephant battle in human history.
17:30Elephants were the ancient tanks.
17:33They were heavy.
17:35They were massive.
17:36They were impressive.
17:38They had archers on their back.
17:39And they were quite destructive.
17:43They're prepared for combat.
17:46Used to hearing the war drum, the beat of the weapons and moving around in formations.
17:51And above all, their aggression is developed to confront fellow soldiers.
17:55At Raphia, the elephant battalions were positioned in the flanks, on the front line ahead of cavalry and soldiers.
18:06In all, 170 war elephants were assembled on the battlefield.
18:11The Seleucids relied on Indian elephants, which they had transported through their empire.
18:16While the Lajids had a battalion of African elephants at their disposal.
18:22So the Northern Africa, which is a breed that is now extinct, were smaller than the Indian elephants.
18:31They were African elephants that the Ptolemies had brought from present-day Somalia,
18:37that traveled across the Red Sea on large ships called elephant carriers.
18:42Just as we have aircraft carriers today, there were elephant carriers in ancient times.
18:54We have depictions specifically from the Roman period.
18:57Some mosaics of ships carrying elephants.
19:01And I always ask my students about this.
19:03How can you fit an elephant in a ship?
19:05The Ptolemaic fleet was the forte of their army.
19:11It was capable of transporting elephants and enabled them to establish their dominance at sea.
19:18Under Ptolemy IV, the Lajid Empire was at its height.
19:24It stretches from Nubia in present-day Sudan to the north of the Aegean Sea.
19:30They controlled most sea routes, with a primary motivation of keeping their Macedonian and Seleucid enemies at bay.
19:40Their empire was defensive.
19:43The Ptolemy's wanted to create powerful naval power.
19:48They built what is called a thalassocracy.
19:52Thalasso the sea and craty power, the control of maritime space.
19:57Ptolemy IV had an exceptional heritage.
20:01The founder of his dynasty, Pharaoh Ptolemy I, was a great ship owner.
20:06He had ordered the construction of a huge fleet.
20:08He had 330 warships and hundreds of other ships to transport troops and equipment.
20:21There had never been such a powerful fleet.
20:24Even in land battles, like the Battle of Rafah for example, all these troops went there by ships, by boats.
20:39Including their armaments, their weapons, their horses, their whatever, all went by boats.
20:44We know that under Ptolemy IV, the fleet of the Ptolemies exceeded up to 3,000 ships.
20:53And this is a huge number.
20:59Triremes were the most common warships in ancient times.
21:02They first appeared in Athens in the 5th century BCE.
21:07A replica has been built by archaeologists in an attempt to uncover the secrets behind the success of this legendary ship.
21:15This boat, Trirem Olympias, is unique in the world.
21:21The length of the boat is 35 meters.
21:26The maximum width is 5.5 meters.
21:30We have 170 rowers.
21:33These are the machine of the boat.
21:36They move the boat.
21:38It's called Trirem because it has three lines of rowers.
21:42The construction of the Olympia has enabled us to gain a better understanding of the workings of the Trireme.
21:50Meaning Class III, the smallest boat in Ptolemy's fleet.
21:55Faced with enemy threats, the pharaoh embarked on a supersizing race to maintain control over his maritime space.
22:03But then, we started seeing the quinky reams, septy reams, and bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger ships.
22:10So we start hearing of the 15th and 17th and the 20th.
22:19The ships acted as business card in some kind of way.
22:23The ships displayed and manifested the power of the king that had built them.
22:28The different kingdoms competed on naval warfare.
22:33They engaged in a boasting war, which reached its peak during the reign of Ptolemy IV.
22:41We know that under the IV Ptolemy, the sizes of ships exceeded a limit that was never known before.
22:48The sizes of ships were all the way until the 40, which was two 20s connected together.
22:52What does these numbers mean?
22:55If we assume that the III is a ship with three levels like the Olympias, what would the 15 be?
23:05The architecture of the largest ships is still poorly understood.
23:10But we know their size must reflect the destructive capacity of the Ptolemaic fleet.
23:17With the largest war fleet ever built, Ptolemy asserted his supremacy over the Mediterranean.
23:27Naval battles enabled the Ptolemies to conquer key territories such as Cyprus.
23:33The Greek pharaohs used the island as a strategic military outpost.
23:44Salamis is only 85 kilometers from the Syrian coast.
23:51Paphos is 400 kilometers from Alexandria.
23:57The Ptolemies set up a shipyard in Paphos and built a huge port.
24:04Located at the southern tip of the island, it made it possible to sail to Egypt in under two days.
24:12A specialist in ancient cities and their defense, Claire Boulondier has been conducting archaeological research in Paphos for 35 years.
24:26Their aim was to protect the Nile Valley, Egypt, the heart of their kingdom.
24:30So they tried to control the surrounding territories.
24:36Cyprus formed part of this protective layer around Egypt.
24:43The Ptolemies took possession of the island of Cyprus, turning it into a guard post against the Seleucid threat.
24:49There seems to be a garrison established here, a military colony, a small town for soldiers to control the port in particular.
25:02Then there was a real planned town, a small Alexandria, emerging from the ground.
25:09And building the world's largest navy requires vast quantities of wood.
25:18There aren't any forests in Egypt, so they had to look elsewhere for wood.
25:24The Paphos site is very close to the Trudos Mountains, and it's a beautiful forest, so they can get sap, tar and wood for shipbuilding.
25:33As well as timber, Cyprus is rich in resources, it has large granaries and a wealth of minerals, the most important of which is copper.
25:47Copper takes its name from the island Kypros.
25:50Copper is used to make bronze armor, since both copper and tin are needed to make the helmets, and armor for the equipment of ancient armies.
26:07This is the gymnasium at Salamis in Cyprus.
26:10Once the Ptolemies had established their power on the island, these garrisons needed to train and prepare for war.
26:18So there were gymnasiums, a place where you could go naked to train and physically prepare.
26:23The soldiers train in a large central area called the Palestra.
26:29It's in the open air, covered in sand, conditions similar to the battlefields.
26:35It can be combat sports, pugmasia wrestling, where you fight and learn to take blows, work on your balance and develop your strength and endurance.
26:49It can also be practical sports such as javelin, discus throwing, jumping, running, which prepare the fighter for a whole range of activities they might encounter in war.
26:59We know inside the gymnasiums, there were stones that you could carry above your head, enabling combatants to develop their muscles to endure the torments of war, to carry the equipment, which was heavy, and to do it for extended periods in the sun.
27:17In 222 BCE, Ptolemy IV controlled the entire eastern Mediterranean.
27:29He had solid military support, which kept his enemies out of reach.
27:34But just a hundred kilometers away, the archenemy Seleucid Empire has just crowned its new king, Antiochus III.
27:41Just 18 years old, he is determined to restore his ancestor's empire.
27:49As soon as he ascended the throne, Antiochus was thirsty for revenge.
27:54He wanted to reconquer Coelcyria and push back the Egyptian empire.
27:59Why not even crush Ptolemy IV?
28:02In Seleucid tradition, a good ruler should excel on the battlefield, in the image of Alexander the Great.
28:08The war is on.
28:12Antiochus first seized Seleucia of Peiria.
28:16He breached Ptolemy's defenses and made dangerous progress towards Egypt.
28:23When Antiochus started progressing towards Egypt,
28:28Ptolemy IV, and especially his chief minister, Saussebius, stole for time.
28:33He was very skillful. He entered into negotiations with Antiochus III.
28:40There was even an armistice for several months during the winter of 219 to 218.
28:46This enabled him to send recruiters to Greece to recruit soldiers.
28:51The aim was to build an army capable of repelling the Seleucid invaders.
28:56Maritime dominance also provides access to soldiers far from Egypt's borders.
29:07The Lajids recruited highly specialized elite troops to complete their army.
29:13Among them, Cretan archers.
29:15Well-versed in military exercises, they are reputed to be formidable warriors.
29:25They need to move easily on the decks of ships, on top of fortifications or on the battlefield, to be sent to the right or the left, wherever they are needed.
29:34They are extremely versatile and professional mercenaries.
29:38These archers will use virtually the same equipment in every city.
29:42Firstly, a double-curved bow, a composite bow.
29:46It will be made of sinew, wood and bone.
29:49Then they are going to have an arrow.
29:51These arrows here are historical reproductions with a beautiful tail.
29:54Tar pitch to hold the feathers and a triangular point at the front.
30:01This is what we find in archaeology because everything else unfortunately has degraded.
30:08Archers are mercenaries, professional fighters, who are also prepared for hand-to-hand combat.
30:16They will have short straight blades, xiphos and pelts.
30:20For the Battle of Rafia, these archers were one of the only units capable of attacking the elephants.
30:28Having good accuracy, they could both shoot the mahouts to prevent the elephants being led, and even shoot the soldiers in the towers above the elephants.
30:39Mahouts are elephant trainers. Sitting on the animal's head, they lead them into battle.
30:44Without them, the elephants become uncontrollable and can turn against their own side.
30:53In Rafia, the archers are mainly positioned around the elephants, ready to defend their battalion and attack the opposing unit.
31:01Three thousand archers will join the pharaoh's army.
31:05They will fight alongside tens of thousands of other mercenaries from the farthest reaches of the empire.
31:10Soldiers were recruited from Greece with various backgrounds.
31:17There were also Thracians from what is now Bulgaria and Galatians.
31:22In other words, Celts, Gauls in fact, but Gauls who lived in Asia Minor, where they had settled.
31:27Minister Sosipios also decided to train 20,000 Egyptians for the Macedonian phalanx, the Macomo.
31:39Until then, the Egyptians had been confined to stewardship roles.
31:44This was the first time they had taken up arms.
31:47Before this, it was only citizens of Greek and Macedonian descent who formed the ranks of the army.
31:56Because the Ptolemies did not want any civic demands to arise from military training.
32:04These Macomo will be trained for several months in the greatest secrecy.
32:08So, let's go. The bottom of the Sarissa needs to be next to your right foot always.
32:17En garde!
32:19The Macomo played a crucial role in the Battle of Raffaea.
32:23In the spring of 217 BCE, the Pharaoh's army sets off eastwards.
32:3570,000 soldiers, 5,000 horsemen, and 73 elephants traveled by land and sea.
32:42Conflict was inevitable.
32:49Ptolemy IV did not go to war alone.
32:51Pharaoh's ruled and fought in pairs.
32:55His sister wife, Arsenault, also went to the battlefield.
33:03June 21, 217 BCE.
33:07The enemy troops set up their respective camps just a few kilometers apart.
33:12Tensions are at their height.
33:15It was then that Theodotus, a traitor, challenged the security of the Lajid camp.
33:21Very early in the morning, Theodotus managed to break into Ptolemy IV's camp with the aim of assassinating him.
33:31He entered the royal tent, but Ptolemy IV was nowhere to be seen.
33:35Actually, Ptolemy's doctor, Andreas, was there, and it was he who Theodotus murdered.
33:46A murder that will precipitate the battle.
33:49War is imminent.
33:50The next day, Ptolemy's army faces Antiochus' army on the battlefield.
33:57A total of 130,000 men, 11,000 horsemen, and 175 war elephants prepared to fight.
34:05The battle of Raffia starts with Antiochus III.
34:13He launches his war elephants on the Ptolemaic war elephants.
34:18The fight is colossal.
34:28These are living tanks, with mercenaries mounted on them who are hard to reach.
34:33Never before in history have so many elephants been present on a battlefield.
34:44The Indian elephants in the Seleucid camp quickly get the better of the African elephants.
34:49Antiochus III had more elephants, around 100 compared to Ptolemy's 73.
34:59The elephants in Ptolemy's camp panicked when Antiochus' elephants charged them.
35:06The problem is that when an elephant panics, it's impossible to regain control and it often turns against its own side.
35:14Ptolemy's formation will be completely broken when its own elephants turn and run.
35:21This disruption of the ranks favored Antiochus' charge, which crushed the Ptolemaic left wing.
35:29Frightened by the elephants, Ptolemy's cavalry fled several kilometers.
35:35At that very moment, Antiochus made a serious mistake.
35:39He set off in pursuit of the routed cavalry.
35:44Antiochus followed the cavalry, Fli茅, because he was sure that Ptolemy IV was among the cavalry.
35:58If he manages to reach the pharaoh, he could hail victory with a minimum loss.
36:02But Ptolemy was hiding behind his phalanx in the center of his line of battle.
36:15With Antiochus away from the battlefield, the Seleucid camp was weakened.
36:22The advantage could swing in favor of Ptolemy.
36:25It was at this point that Arsenault, the pharaoh's sister and wife, arrived.
36:31And this played a very important role according to Polybius, where to boost the morale of the army she promised gold during a powerful speech.
36:39It was tradition in ancient kingdoms for rulers in general to give a speech to their troops.
36:49Generally, mercenaries are paid in silver coins.
36:53She promises them gold coins to motivate them.
36:56If you win, you'll be paid in gold coins.
36:59A strategy that will pay off.
37:01The horsemen of Ptolemy's right wing launched their attack.
37:08To avoid the elephants of Antiochus, they would bypass the Seleucid wing and cause a debacle of these outside units.
37:17Ptolemy then ordered a frontal assault with his Greek phalanx and his new Egyptian recruits.
37:22The battle then swung in favor of the Legidians, who flanked their enemies.
37:41But how can the Seleucid's retreat be explained?
37:44The great disadvantage of the Macedonian phalanx is that it cannot pivot to the left.
37:54If the phalanx is caught flanking and suddenly wants to tilt the lances, they'll be blocked by their companions.
38:00Example, gentlemen, pivot to the left.
38:04It can't work. The Cerises are far too big.
38:07At Raffia, the Cerises are the longest they've ever been.
38:09They protrude five meters at the front and almost a meter at the back.
38:15Any rotation greatly weakens the phalangites.
38:18If they want to rotate the formation, they're going to have to straighten the Cerises,
38:23make a quarter turn left and tilt the Cerises again.
38:28This is extremely difficult if the formation is very long.
38:33With a single line it's possible, but with a phalanx that can exceed several thousand fighters,
38:38it's much harder.
38:39If one of the phalanges is bypassed, it's death.
38:41If one of the phalanges is bypassed, it's death.
38:52Antiochus finally understood his mistake.
38:55Ptolemy was not ahead of him.
38:57In the distance, he could see clouds of dust rising and closing in on his camp.
39:07Something was wrong.
39:10When Antiochus III, far from the battle, finally returned to the fight, it was too late.
39:21His army had retreated and he realized he had made a huge mistake thinking he was pursuing Ptolemy.
39:26It's a serious mistake, especially as at the time, the Hellenistic king had to be present at the battle, like Alexander the Great.
39:35He led his men and so Antiochus III's troops fled all the more easily without their king in sight.
39:43The Ptolemaic cavalry pursued and massacred the fleeing Seleucids.
39:47Antiochus could do nothing more.
39:50He too was forced to flee.
39:52And so the Seleucid army collapsed.
39:54And despite heroic resistance, the losses on the Seleucid side, especially in the phalanx, were enormous.
40:05The battle resulted in losing all the territories he had conquered in the last two years, except for Seleucia.
40:12He could keep Seleucia of Pyrrhea.
40:18Some 13,000 men were killed in the battle, alongside 1,000 horses and 20 elephants.
40:26The pharaohs have once again defeated their hereditary enemy.
40:32With this victory, not only was the Ptolemaic domination of the region saved, but the whole of Egypt.
40:39Queen Arsenault's promise of gold had crucially impacted the outcome of the battle.
40:50Would she keep her word?
40:53The Richelieu Library holds one of the largest collections of Greek coins in the world, with over 120,000 pieces.
41:01The sinew of war. Money has played an essential role in ancient history.
41:08But the Battle of Raffia changed this for good.
41:11Julien Olivier manages the collections in the coin department.
41:16He is one of the few people authorized to handle this treasure.
41:20Some of the coins Arsenault promised on the battlefield have survived 2,200 years of history.
41:27These are the heavy Ptolemaic gold coins, which weigh around 27.8 grams, which are gigantic for the Hellenistic period.
41:36In this period it was more like 8 or 9 grams, here we are at 28.
41:40So these are really big coins that represent enormous value.
41:42To understand the coins in more detail, researchers recreated a minting workshop, identical to those that existed in Alexandria.
41:55Historically, we have very few archaeological or written sources on the manufacturing of money.
42:03Today the only means we have to understand it is to study the coin, allowing us to understand how it was made.
42:08Researchers are interested in the tool used to create coins, called a die, an object which strikes and imprints to denote money.
42:20The point of experimentation is to understand the wear and tear of the die.
42:25The die will eventually wear out, whether it is the bottom or the top corner.
42:28When several thousand coins are struck, the wedge eventually breaks, making it impossible to continue using it.
42:41A new corner is then engraved.
42:44By studying these different dies, researchers can calculate the number of coins produced at a given time.
42:50They were able to study these series of large gold coins and discover they were mass-produced.
42:58And they are all connected.
43:01All this gold, all this coinage, was produced in one block, in an extremely short period of time.
43:09And it corresponds to the reward distributed at the end of the Battle of Raffia.
43:13Ptolemy and Arsenault were determined to use this victory to elevate themselves to the rank of the gods and great pharaohs of antiquity.
43:28In the aftermath of the battle, they ordered the construction of the Raffia Stila.
43:32Ptolemy IV and Arsenault III are not just portrayed as great military victors, but pious rulers who defended Egyptian religion and temples.
43:46The rulers are both victorious and pious.
43:57But Ptolemy was not content with the decree.
43:59He wanted his legend inscribed alongside the great ancient warrior pharaohs, in the heart of the new empire, in the sacred temple of Karnak.
44:14Here, they built the largest sanctuary in Egypt.
44:18Ptolemy IV restored the central structure and engraved his name and image on the top of the columns.
44:26He rose to the heights of pharaohs, like Thutmose III and Ramses II.
44:29The great pharaohs of the new kingdom used all their wealth, their empire's spoils, and gifts from conquered people to build this great temple in honor of Amun.
44:52This was the god of heaven, a great creator, who was considered to be the equivalent of Ri, the god of the sun.
45:02It was on the walls of this temple that they glorified themselves, displayed their military glory, and inscribed their legend.
45:17Ptolemy tried to bring back the prestige of the new empire.
45:24But this was not enough to keep the peace.
45:27After the Battle of Raphia, a wave of revolt swept through Egypt.
45:31The Battle of Raphia was a paradoxical victory, undoubtedly a great victory for Ptolemy IV and Arsenault III, who saved their kingdom.
45:44But the consequences were disastrous for the Ptolemae kingdom.
45:47There were tax revolts, because Ptolemy IV and Swasibius had to raise taxes to finance the war effort and maintain their unique lifestyle.
46:01A lifestyle of royal splendor, made up of all kinds of excess.
46:12Far from the concerns of the people, Ptolemy IV ordered the construction of a floating palace, the Thalamos.
46:20Thalamos in Greek means the bedroom, the palace, and it's a colossal boat, the biggest ship ever built.
46:32It's not a warship, it's a state ship.
46:39Faced with this reckless extravagance and contempt for the people, the Egyptians became angry.
46:45Particularly, the Makamo, the soldiers enlisted in Raphia.
46:51They did not get the land they were promised.
46:54Karnak, Edfu, Abu Simbel, all the major sites in southern Egypt are about to fall into the hands of the insurgents.
47:03Upper Egypt became an independent kingdom.
47:07The rebels demanded a pharaoh chosen from the local elite, named Hoennifer.
47:12Ptolemy IV would never regain control of the region.
47:18Ptolemy IV died prematurely, at just 34 years of age.
47:24In the end, Ptolemy IV died just 13 years after the Battle of Raphael.
47:29It was his sister and wife, Arsenault III, who acted as queen for the child they had had together.
47:35After the death of Ptolemy IV, Sosabius again leveraged his power to murder the ruling queen, Arsenaulte,
47:45to gain power over the new king, Ptolemy V.
47:49In the end, Egypt was weakened by all this.
47:52And a few decades later, these Hellenistic kingdoms gave way to a new arrival in the eastern Mediterranean, Rome.
47:59Rome.
48:00Rome.
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