The Philistine Warrior (15 page)
“My God!” I managed to say. I’d heard of such things, but never seen it up close. “Their own people….” No wonder Jaita felt so bad—taking their weapons had meant we should have protected them…. “Did they kill everyone?” I asked, looking around for signs of life.
“Some of the young men apparently joined the guerrillas,” Jaita told me. “A lot of others fled toward Ekron.”
My temper rose in impotent fury: “Some of them…
joined
the guerrillas—after
this
?! I pointed to the woman’s corpse.
“Major Phicol,” he began, wearily, “we interrogated what survivors we could find. They say the guerrillas threatened to kill anyone who wouldn’t join them—any of the young males, that is.
Besides, the guerrillas said
we
would kill them if they stayed—for failing to defend their village….”
“Defend? With what? A few clubs and hoes?” I sputtered.
“That’s what they said,” Jaita concluded. “That’s what this war against villages comes to.”
It was true—and I had spent too much of my still fairly young life fighting other warriors, gallant warfare in my chariot; I wasn’t used to this sort of race warfare among civilians…. We turned away from that scene of death and mutilation and walked over to the campfire our men had just set up. “I’d like to bring Ittai here—the next time he wonders why he’s so goddamned ‘popular’ in the hill country,” I muttered. Warati, of course, would be happy to see Danites slaughtering Danites. “We sure don’t have enough men to protect civilians who cooperate with us; Ittai doesn’t, and Warati wouldn’t help even if he could, which he can’t—again, lack of manpower. We can storm around wherever we like, but we can’t occupy everything we conquer….”
“Could we take everybody, every Danite civilian who feels threatened, take them back to Ekron for the duration?” Jaita asked.
“I’m afraid Ekron’s already crowded with Philistine refugees and Danite slaves. Anyway, people who fled to Ekron would lose their farms; and some day they’d have to come back, and how could we protect them then? Their neighbors—the guerrillas—are quite determined to free them all from
us
, even if ‘free’ means getting killed by those same guerrillas!”
“If they’re lucky enough just to get killed,” Jaita added.
I should have said something to cheer him up, but I couldn’t think of a thing—except to assure him that he wasn’t to blame. “It’s not your fault, Jaita. Your job’s to keep us supplied, not to guard villages. But I know Ittai won’t agree to leave such people their weapons, and I don’t blame him, either. Not that it’d do the villagers much good—to keep their pitiful weapons; they couldn’t outfight the guerrillas anyway, so their weapons would just fall into the hands of the enemy, by capture…or by the desertion of whatever villagers secretly side with the guerrillas.”
We sat down to have a bite to eat. We could see for miles around—except to the north, where a range of hills blocked the view. I thought: there must be Danites up there right now, watching us….
“I’ve ordered their burial—and the others, too,” Jaita noted; and we settled down to our meal.
In such fashion, we found ourselves more and more in trouble the deeper we advanced into Danite country. On the other hand, we did manage to arrange a shaky alliance with a few clans of the tribe of Benjamin—which had a blood feud going with the Danites at that time. Indeed, when we reached Kirjathjearim, these clans swarmed down out of their hills and spread terror among the Danites. They were very fierce, and much less civilized even than the Danites, who still had some Aegean blood in them.
I’ll never forget one particularly shaggy Benjaminite I met, with his black beard, his flowing robe, and his strong, gleaming teeth. Like all Canaanites, he worshiped Astarte and Ba’al (whom the Canaanites in their ignorance consider the son of Dagon), and he also believed in sacrificing everything in sight in order to obtain the favor of these deities. He told me—in pride—the story of how a certain Canaanite chieftain, a Hebrew named Jephthah, had, some years before, sacrificed his own daughter to one of their tribal gods in return for victory in battle.
This god is called “Yahweh,” and He is one of their most important deities—their war god, by the way. They envisage Yahweh as a bull-god, thus alluding to His power and, I suppose, to His virility. Of course, we Philistines sometimes use the bull as a symbol of our storm god—but most of us are aware of the fact that this is merely symbolism; I’m not so sure that the average Canaanite is capable of making that kind of distinction.
My Benjaminite “ally” fingered his scimitar and grinned as he told me the tale of Jephthah’s daughter; no doubt he was relishing the thought of sacrificing some wretched Danite he’d just captured—and I shuddered as I imagined our own women falling into such hands. I
looked down on him from my chariot in disgust and loathing, knowing that the Benjaminites would just as cheerfully have turned on us, if they hadn’t been so intent on murdering their Danite neighbors at that time. I’m reminded of Agamemnon’s sacrifice of
his
daughter—and of how our women had to flee from the Greeks, when they invaded Karia. It seems that we Philistines are forever caught between Scylla and Charybdis—as the Aegean peoples might put it. Yet even we are not above human sacrifice, on rare occasion. I hate to say such things of my countrymen, but…well, that’s another story, for later.
So long as we were in relatively flat country, the Danites didn’t dare attack us except in petty, harassment raids. But as we went inland, the terrain became rougher, and my chariots less and less effective. Finally, we had to dismantle them altogether in order to get them over some of the most narrow and rocky passes. It was distressing to see our chariots in pieces, on the backs of pack animals. My charioteers, unused to walking, soon had sore feet and legs; the jagged rocks cut through their sandals, while thorn bushes tore at their ankles and calves—all to the delight of Warati’s infantrymen.
In such circumstances, our chariots became worse than useless, and the Danites became bolder, cutting our lines of communication, harassing our camps, ambushing our foragers; sickness and fatigue also took their toll. We should never have gone so far into the hills with only a brigade—indeed, such foolishness had never been contemplated in our original plan, and I continually urged Sheren Ittai to order a retreat.
“Retreat? Never!” Colonel Warati shouted whenever I brought up the subject. “It’s just too bad about your men’s dainty feet!” And, for Sheren Ittai, he had words of this sort: “M’Lord, all Ekron’s thrilled by your campaign. Don’t turn back now!” Ittai, as usual, took this commoner’s advice—backed up as it was by a barrage of letters from Maoch; that is, really from Chancellor Zaggi.
Yet finally Ittai and even Warati had to face facts. We were at
Bethel
, having pursued a Danite clan high into the mountains of Benjaminite territory; there, Danite diplomacy proved our undoing. The tribesmen of Ephraim, upon whose lands we Philistines had
transgressed—and who were rivals of Benjamin—now rose up against us, allying with Dan. Ephraimites distracted the
Benjaminites, joined the Danites in attacking us, and, worst of all, managed to capture a supply train upon which we had based many of our calculations. Poor Jaita found himself in a very bad position—through no fault of his own; he and his chariots succeeded in escaping the Ephraimite net only by the narrowest of margins.
Without this supply train, Sheren Ittai now had no choice but to retreat. And so the loss of that train was a kind of blessing in disguise, because otherwise we would doubtless have plunged ahead into an even worse disaster. As it was, our “retreat” was really an advance in another direction, inasmuch as we had to fight our way out of the hills in the face of Danite and Ephraimite roadblocks and fortified camps. We had to fight pitched battles now, instead of mere counter-guerrilla style war, and losses on both sides became increasingly heavy. Alas, we could not replace our losses.
Bled and spent, we’ve fought a weary way…The
Danites came…and even now are on our trail!
These lines from the
Nomiad
popped into my mind one night in camp, when everything was quiet…almost too quiet…. But I also recalled another stanza, and it made me yet gloomier:
In those days the Danites multiplied…where the Hebrews
Lived,
And married with them there. Some other clans of
Israel
Grew tired
Of Jabin’s rule and rose up under Deborah at Tobor’s
Mount.
Sisera—for so the Hebrews called Lord Bene—went to
Crush the Hebrew band;
Chariots stuck in the mud; sank into the sand!
Meanwhile, far to the south of
Jerusalem
and Beth-Shemesh, the Judaeans also began to pour out of their hills, massacring the Philistines living near Ziklag and
Lachish
—indeed, all the way to
Gath
. The whole border of
Philistia
caught flame, as Canaanites of the Plain began to side with the invaders, either secretly or in open rebellion against us; either because they hated us or because they feared Judaean intimidation. In such a chaotic situation, not even
Gath
could provide forces for our rescue, and Ekron’s expeditionary brigade continued to fall back, with heavy casualties, toward Beth-Shemesh.
Ittai’s tactics in retreat were no better than they had been in advance. One night when we made camp, I noticed that the brigade was much too strung out in the narrow valley we’d entered—especially since one of Ekron’s battalions, the rear-guard, had been posted to the other side of a ridge. I suppose Ittai wanted to make sure the Ephraimites didn’t seize that ridge and then overlook our main body; yet it seemed to me that our dispositions were an open invitation for a pincer attack, wherein the ridge could be used to isolate our rear-guard. My popularity at headquarters was at an all-time low, however, and so I didn’t complain to Ittai about the placing of our rear-guard; it wouldn’t have done any good anyway.
Sure enough, there was a night attack; the enemy gained that intervening ridge, thus surrounding our luckless rear-guard—a whole battalion, about one fifth of our brigade! At the same time, Warati’s battalions were under attack—they were in the van—and therefore couldn’t come to the rear-guard’s rescue. Ittai, furthermore, was afraid to commit his one remaining battalion during the night; so the rear-guard fought on, alone and abandoned.
Very soon it was first light and all of this became clear to me. I called Jaita over to my tent: “How many assembled chariots do we have?” I asked him.
“Twenty, m’Lord,” he replied.
“And two fresh horses for each?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Form them up, with the rest of our fellows as infantry. We’re going up that ridge….”
Jaita raised an eyebrow. “That’ll be costly, m’Lord,” he commented.
“I know. But if we move, Ittai will have no choice but to support us with his uncommitted battalion. Then we can link up with the rear-guard; otherwise, those poor bastards don’t stand a chance.”
“Yes, sir!” he saluted and turned to go.
I sent a message to Ittai announcing my plan. I didn’t ask permission, but merely said that his reserve battalion must follow me.
This was pretty high-handed of me, I’ll admit, but otherwise (I feared) he just wouldn’t do anything.
Next, I mounted my chariot and outlined the situation for my men. At that moment, a staff officer showed up with Ittai’s agreement to my plan. Whew!
I signaled for our standard to be raised. “Forward at the walk,” I commanded. My foot soldiers kept pace with the chariots as we moved slowly up the rise toward the enemy. Arrows showered down on us, but most of them fell short. One horse fell over on the right wing.
“Cut it loose!” Captain Jaita shouted. “Don’t stop! Whip up your remaining horse!” That one poor beast would now have to do the work of two for that chariot—and naturally said vehicle fell behind, until its driver and warriors dismounted and walked along side, hoping to remount once the crest was achieved.
At least, I told myself, we’re drawing off enemy archers who’d otherwise be closing in on our rear-guard. Small as our force was, we must have looked quite formidable—I had counted on the effect our dreaded chariots would have on enemy morale, despite the slow pace of our advance. The enemy well knew that, once we gained level ground, we could run rings around them. Perhaps, too, they would soon spot Ittai’s advancing battalion.
Meanwhile, we would make good targets as we got within range of the Ephraimites’ hurled spears and javelins. I prayed that my archers would keep our enemies confused and spoil their aim until we could charge. “Fire,” I signaled, and our own arrows darkened the sky. “Fire again! Keep it up!” I shouted—and only I (and Jaita) knew how few arrows we had left in our supply wagons, with no hope of resupply unless we could hold on to this battlefield after the fight. My chariot lurched as its wheels hit rock after rock. Two chariots had stopped dead in their tracks now, and several warriors were down.
“Don’t bunch up!” I heard Jaita call.
Just then my driver dropped with an arrow in his throat, and another man took his place. The enemy rose up before us—their spears came hurtling at us! Too soon! Rattled, the enemy had hurled too soon. Almost all of them fell short. We were on the crest!
“Now, CHARGE!” I shouted, and our faithful beasts lunged forward at the whip-crack. Exhausted and worn, they gave their all, and my foot soldiers ran along side, panting and gasping to keep up…and we hit the Ephraimite line. They were too brave to run at first; but we’d confused them, and finally they broke ranks, no longer a real unit, and we cut them down by the score until we and our horses lost all breath. I could see that the rear-guard battalion had been largely overrun, the rest in danger still, but my force was spent. Fortunately, I spotted Ittai’s reserve battalion moving up behind me, just as I had planned. My men formed a perimeter to hold onto what we’d conquered—a foothold from which our reserve infantry could launch a drive to rescue the rear-guard.
“We did it!” Jaita called to me. “We did it!”
“Good work, Jaita!” I answered. But then I saw Colonel Warati’s standard: he’d come around the ridge during the night with his second battalion, having extricated it from the struggle in the van, and now he fell upon the Ephraimites who’d encircled our rear-guard. In short, he’d gotten there before Ittai’s reserve battalion could reach the fight.
Warati
had saved the remnants of our rear-guard! “He’s a master of infantry tactics,” I confessed to Jaita.
“And a master of making us look like fools,” he noted, bitterly. True, our attack had done some good—but at too high a cost, as we realized the moment we spotted Warati’s maneuver.
My anger was reserved, however, not for Warati—not that time—but rather for Sheren Ittai, who showed up just then. “Sir!” I demanded, “why wasn’t I told of Warati’s flanking attack?” The Sheren shrugged his shoulders. I fulminated some more: “Don’t you know what we’ve suffered taking his goddamned ridge? And it wasn’t even necessary!”
“I thought you
knew
where the Colonel was, and what he planned,” Ittai responsed, lamely.
“We weren’t in touch!” I exploded. “He didn’t tell me anything! And now I find that our sacrifice wasn’t needed—that we could’ve just feinted an attack and done about as much good!”
“I’m sorry,” he conceded. “But you’ve actually been a great help.” As he spoke, I could see his reserve battalion consolidating its breakthrough and linking up with Warati, at last rescuing the remainder of the rear-guard. “There, you see, Major Phicol—there they go….” And yet the whole point of throwing my chariots uphill—against all the rules of chariot tactics—was to force Ittai to make up his mind to help rescue the rear-guard; an unnecessary ploy, had I known that Warati was on his way.
But what could I say except: “Yes, m’Lord….” Being conciliatory was hard to do, considering the number of chariots, axles, horses—and above all men—I’d lost. And how few Ekronites I’d saved who wouldn’t have been rescued by Warati anyway. The upshot was that I’d now caught Sheren Ittai in a serious fault—his failure to keep me informed, his failure to coordinate his forces…and in my anger, I’d used some pretty heated-up words to him, my superior officer, even in the presence of some of his own enlisted men…and mine. His first reaction—to his credit—was an apology, and praise for my unit’s work; but all too soon—and with Warati’s help, of course—he would convince himself that I was somehow at fault; me and my charioteers.
I took some consolation from having done as much as we did. Indeed, we stayed on that goddamned ridge for as long as we wanted, tending our wounded, burning our dead (unburned bodies would inevitably be mutilated by the enemy), and replenishing our supply of weapons—above all arrows—from the battlefield. Nevertheless, our victory, including Warati’s, had not altered the basic situation: we were still obliged to continue our retreat—and we continued to take casualties.
As we fell back, we came upon the bodies of our comrades of the van who’d been captured by the enemy. We didn’t see at first just how they’d been killed—until we moved them for burning…and then
we found that each one had been
sawed
in
half
at the belt, while still alive. And their genitals were missing.
The Canaanite soldiers in our brigade, though loyal enough, were neither so hardy nor so steadfast as our Philistines, and they suffered severely during our retreat. Warati held his men together with admirable discipline, of course, but also with heavy losses. And so we gradually managed to fight our way out of the hills. Worst hit of all were my charioteers, unaccustomed as they were to fighting, and retreating, on foot. Many of our horses were killed—some by us for food—and many of our dismantled chariots had to be destroyed and their remains abandoned. This was particularly unfortunate, because, without our full complement of vehicles and horses, we weren’t able to regain the initiative, even after we finally reached the open plain.
I repeat: it was the Sheren of Ekron who’d ordered us into that hilly trap—against my advice—but Colonel Warati, who knew better, nevertheless insisted on blaming me for my squadron’s losses; and he tried to blame me for much more, including the capture of that goddamned supply train! All of this was out of spite—and for a political purpose, as well: Warati continued to ingratiate himself with Sheren Ittai, who conveniently forgot where the real blame lay, and who therefore sent back glowing reports of Warati’s worth to Askelon and Gaza. Thus it was that, even as we retreated, Colonel Warati’s star continued to rise.
Indeed, when we finally staggered back within the safety of Ekron’s walls, we heard some startlilng news concerning our friend Warati. First, we learned that Maoch and Zaggi had promoted Warati to the rank of brigadier general, thereby conferring noble status upon him. (Warati’s opinion of the aristocracy began to change rather rapidly after that, surprisingly enough!) But that was just the beginning. Next, we received a top secret message from Askelon, informing us that the Sheren of Gaza had recently been assassinated! It seems that he was neatly done in by a rival faction, consisting largely of his wife and her lover; the woman herself had driven home the knife while her husband slept.
Hard on the heels of that news came another message, this time from Melek Nasuy in
Gath
. He confirmed the report of trouble in
Gaza
: the Sheren was indeed quite dead, but the Assembly of Gazan Nobility had already arrested both the grieving widow and her bosom companion—and had put them on trial. They were, within minutes, convicted of murder, adultery, and high treason (I’ve listed those crimes from left to right in ascending order of importance), and they were both forthwith stoned to death in front of the Temple of Dagon there in Gaza.
Melek Nasuy, however, forbade us to say anything in public about
Gaza
’s internal affairs; in fact, the whole business was to be kept secret from the masses, until an official statement could come out of
Gaza
. Ekron, of course, had plenty of her own problems to worry about, and
Gaza
’s troubles didn’t seem to have much to do with us—except for the Gazan battalion, still under Warati’s command. But Nasuy was correct: with invasion and rebellion on the rise all over
Philistia
, this was no time to let rumors get started about political strife within the Philistine ruling class.