A Hittite soldier who failed his archery dril

A Hittite soldier who failed his archery drill was not beaten. Instead, he was dressed in women’s clothing, given a distaff and a mirror, and paraded before his unit. In the most powerful empire of the Bronze Age, humiliation was a weapon of command. These were the warriors of Hatti — the Anatolian superpower of the 14th and 13th centuries BC. At their height, the kings of the Hittites matched the Egyptian Pharaohs as equals, ruling a multi-ethnic empire from the Anatolian plateau.
The Hittite infantryman, the LÚ GISTUKUL (“Man of the Weapon”), wore bronze scale armor over leather, carried a two-meter spear balanced for thrusting and throwing, and used a short stabbing sword with a crescent pommel. Their most devastating innovation: three-man chariots with a dedicated shield-bearer, creating a heavier, more defensive, stable platform than anything else of the time. At Kadesh in 1274 BC, these chariots absorbed Egyptian charges that might otherwise have broken their lines.