The Hittite - Ben Bova [15]
Then a handful of thetes began pushing on the wooden gate. It creaked and groaned as they pushed it slowly, slowly open. The chariots began to stream out onto the plain, the horses’ hooves thudding on the packedearth ramp that cut across the trench running in front of the rampart. All work stopped. The men still down in the trench scrambled up to the top of the rampart so they could watch the impending battle.
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Bronze armor glittered in the sun as the chariots clattered through the gate and arrayed themselves in line abreast. Most were pulled by two horses, though a few had teams of four. The horses neighed and stamped their hooves nervously, as if they sensed the mayhem that was in store. I counted seventy-nine chariots, a pitifully small number compared to the assemblages of the army of the Hatti.
I myself had seen more than a thousand chariots assembled before the walls of Babylon. My grandfather claimed there were ten thousand at the battle of Megiddo.
Each of the Achaian chariots bore two men, one handling the horses, the other armed with several spears of different weights and lengths. The longest were more than twice the height of a warrior, even in his bronze helmet with its plume of brightly dyed horse hair.
Both men in each chariot wore bronze breastplates, helmets and arm guards. I could not see their legs but I guessed that they were sheathed in greaves, as well. Most of the chariot drivers carried small round targes strapped to their left forearms. Each of the warriors held a heavy hourglass-shaped shield that was nearly as tall as he was, covering him from chin to ankles. I caught the glitter of gold and silver on the hilts of their swords. Many of the charioteers had bows slung across their backs or hooked against the chariot rail.
A huge shout went up as the last chariot passed through the gate and down the heavily trodden rampway that crossed the trench. The four horses pulling it were magnificent matched blacks, glossy and sleek. The warrior standing in it seemed stockier than most of the others, his armor filigreed with gold inlays.
“That’s the High King!” said Poletes over the roar of the shouting men. “That’s Agamemnon.”
“Is Achilles with them?” I asked.
“No. But that giant over on the left is Great Ajax,” he pointed, excited despite himself. “There’s Odysseos, and—”
An echoing roar reached us from the battlements of Troy. A cloud of dust showed that a contingent of chariots was filing out of the large gate on the right side of the city’s wall and winding its way down the incline that led to the plain before us.
Foot soldiers were hurrying out of our makeshift gate now, menatarms bearing bows, slings, axes, cudgels. Down the ramp of packed sand they hurried and spread out behind the line of Achaian chariots. A few of them wore armor or chain mail, but most of them had nothing more protective than leather vests, some studded with bronze pieces. Squinting into the bright sunshine, I saw that Trojan footmen were lining up behind their chariots. None of the troops marched in order, on either side; they simply ambled out like a horde of undisciplined rabble.
The two armies assembled themselves facing each other on the windswept plain. It grew strangely quiet. The clouds of dust the chariots had raised eddied away on the breeze coming from the sea. The river we had forded the day before formed a natural boundary to the battlefield on our right, while a smaller meandering stream defined the left flank. Beyond their far banks the ground on both sides was green with tussocks of long-bladed grass, but the battlefield itself had been worn bare by chariot wheels and the tramping of horses and warriors.
For nearly the time it took to eat a meal, nothing much happened. The armies stood facing each other. The sun climbed higher in the nearly cloudless sky. Horses whinnied nervously. Heralds went out from each side and spoke with each other while the wind gusted in our ears.
“None of the heroes are challenging each other to single combat this day,” explained Poletes.