Isaac Samuel

The war elephants of ancient Aksum and kush (ca. 300 BC- 600 CE)

Added 2024-12-08 17:23:43 +0000 UTC

The grand dionysiac procession of the Greco-Egyptian ruler Ptolemy Philadelphus, which occured around the year 276 BC, includes an unusual scene depicting elephants dragging a chariot along with tribute bearers, some of whom came from the kingdom of Kush whose armies had lost the region of lower Nubia to Philadelphus' armies in 278-279 BC.

Not long after the reign of Philadelphus, the Meroitic kings erected a massive temple dedicated to their national deity; Apedemack. Included in the monumental relief scenes decorating the temple walls are scenes of war elephants equipped with riding gear, presenting bound captives to the King of Kush and the deity Apedemack.

The origins of these tame elephants has been a matter of considerable debate among historians of Ptolemaic Egypt and ancient Kush. The authoritative monograph by the classicist E.E. Rice on the procession of Philadelphus argues that: "the elephants in the Grand Procession are African animals which came to Alexandria via the riverain route, and that, as such, were among the first African elephants to be obtained by the Ptolemies."

While war elephants disappeared from the Ptolemaic armies in the 2nd century BC, they were reported in the armies of Kush's neighbour; the kingdom of Aksum in the early centuries of the common era. The Aksumite general Abraha famously used war elephants for his invasion of Mecca during the 6th century CE, according to Islamic accounts.

This article explores the history of elephant taming in ancient Aksum and Kush, combining textural and archaeological evidence for their presence in the regions of Sudan, Ethiopia and Eritrea from antiquity to the 19th century.

(top) Sarcophagus with the Triumph of Dionysus depicting an elephant chariot, roman period, Proconnesus, Turkey. (bottom) War elephants and bound prisoners from the temple of Musawwarat, mid-3rd century BC, Sudan.

A brief background on the use of elephants in ancient Nubia.

Humans have utilized elephants and their ivory for millennia, especially in Africa, where ivory from both forest and savannah species was exploited. As early as the emergence of the first complex societies on the continent during the 5th-4th millenium BC in the Nile valley, elephant imagery was incoporated into the artistic traditions of the kingdoms of ancient Egypt and Nubia, where the animal was later included into the royal iconography.

Drawings of elephants, and other animals on Nubian A-group (3800-3100BC) pottery suggest that the A-group people were in contact with these animals during the Neolithic period. The A-Group craftsmen made items of personal adornment such as necklaces, amulets, armbands, bracelets, anklets, and pendants, out of ivory among other materials.

Complex societies that emerged after the demise of the A-Group polity, such as the kingdom of Kerma (2500-1500BC), included elephants in their artistic motifs in wall paintings on tombs and temples. Kerma craftsmen inserted ivory inlays in footboards of funerary beds, and made various forms of jewellery as well as ivory handles of copper daggers.

(Elephants in ancient Egypt and Nubia pg 234-235)

Ivory inlay of an elephant, Classic Kerma period, 1700–1550 B.C. Boston Museum of Fine Arts.

While elephants had died out in by 1500BC in the New Kingdom Egypt, Syria and Mesopotamia, due to the drying climate and increased hunting, Elephants continued to play a salient role in the economies of Kush during the Napatan and Meroitic period. Stockpiles of ivory and other commodities were found in palaces of Napatan and Meroitic rulers at Sanam and Wad ben Naga. Carved ivory objects and jewellery appear extensively in Kush's archaeological and textural record, especially as grave goods and as a major export item to Egypt and the Mediterranean world.

(Elephants in Ancient Egypt and Nubia pg 234-235)

Depictions of elephants in Meroitic art resemble elephants found in the region during the 19th century, most of which are thought to be of the shorter-legged forest variety (L. africana cyclotis) that appeared in the armies of the Carthaginians and Ptolemies, and are presumed to be easier to domesticate compared to the the larger, long-legged savanna (L. africana) variety.

(Elephants in Ancient Egypt and Nubia pg 235)

However, recent studies of the nuclear and mitochondrial DNA of a population of Eritrean elephants found in the area of Gash-Barka, suggests that it was the bush elephant that was used in war by the Ptolemies. This indicates that while historical accounts suggest that these elephants were relatively smaller than Indian elephants, contrary to the modern size difference which is the reverse, its likely that both the savanna and forest variety could be domesticated.

(The Elephants of Aksum pg 167-168, Again on the elephants of Rhaphia.)

Relief depicting an elephant at the Musawwarat es-sufra temple, Sudan. Eric Lafforgue

African elephant on the left compared with the Asian elephant on the right. The most obvious difference is the size of the ears.

The War elephants of Meroitic Kush (300BC-360CE): textural and artistic evidence.

The Meroites of Kush were likely familiar with the art of taming African elephants, whether for ceremonial or functional purposes, and Roman accounts indicate that they used these animals in military campaigns, although the begining of elephant taming is still debated.

The Roman historians Strabo and Pliny note that elephants were to be found around Meroë in the 1st century and that they were hunted by the Meroities. And the by the 2nd century, the Greek historian Arrian records that before elephants were employed in warfare by the Macedonians and Carthaginians, they were used by the Kushites and the Indians.

(Elephants in Ancient Egypt and Nubia pg 237, The Kingdom of Kush: The Napatan and Meroitic Empires pg 43, Oxford handbook of ancient Nubia pg 678)

Depictions of elephants are especially common the monumental temple complex of Musawwarat es Sufra, dating to the mid 3rd century BC. In this temple, the animal was frequently represented in relief and sculpture, often symbolically to represent political and religious concepts of Kushite power, but also functionally as beasts of war.

One prominent relief is of a king of Kush, who wears both the crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt, riding bareback on an elephant. On the west wall of the temple, another scene depicts a rope held at the trunk of a column of war elephants which is attached to the neck of a line of kneeling prisoners.

(Hellenising art in Ancient Nubia pg 228-231)

Most Nubiologists argue that the numerous representations of elephants at the same site, suggest that this animal was the object of local cult worship. Perhaps the most telling piece of evidence for Meroitic war elephants is a bronze statuette found in the Nubia Museum at Aswan, which likely dates to later than 250 BCE and whose provenance is uncertain. The statuette depicts a small African elephant with a single rider holding a small shield, which would suggest a military context.

(The elephants of Aksum pg 181)

elephant and rider from the Nubian museum at Aswan.

The use of African war elephants in classical accounts is most often associated with the Greeco-Egyptian ruler Ptolemy II “Philadelphus” who sent various expeditions to North Africa and to parts of modern Eritrea, Sudan and Ethiopia, in search of war elephants. In 280 BCE a port for their shipment was established at Ptolemais Theron (“Ptolemais of the Hunts”) in Egypt as well as the port city of Berenice Troglodyti. The elephants were driven to the coast to be sailed up the Red Sea to the port of Berenice.

Most of the African societies where Ptolemy procured his elephants were familiar with elephant hunting for ivory and meat, but were apparently not in the habit of capturing them alive. The latter process utilised the corral method of trapping the elephants with an enclosed space that contained tame female elephants, and drive in the wild elephants using a team mounted on trained elephants or horses. For the Ptolemies, the taming process itself was initially done by mahouts brought in from India, although other accounts suggest that Meroites and other Aithiopians may have been involved.

(Ptolemy II and the hunting of African elephants pg 248-254, War Elephants pg 72-73, 135)

Relief scene from the naos of Petosiris tomb depicting a procession of Nubian tributes that includes a live elephant (at the bottom left). Photo by L. Torok, Petosiris was high priest of Thoth of Hermopolis and royal scribe during the 4th century BC, ie: a century before Philadelphus undertook his grand elephant-hunting project.

Central to the evidence in favour of domestication of elephants in Kush before the Ptolemies is their invasion of Kush in 279BC or 274 BC, which resulted in the latter's defeat, and the victorious Ptolemies returning with a number of elephants which were evidently already trained before their capture since twenty-four drew wagons in the procession of triumph.

According to a summary of arguments by B.G. Haycock; The reliefs of the Lion-Temple show clear proof of the domestication of elephants; evidently for war. Another scholar, Hintze, argues, following Arrian, that the Kushites knew how to tame elephants before they fell under Greek influence, and it is certain from the Great Enclosure that the elephant was virtually worshipped in that area.

While scholars like Desange and L. Torok argue that this knowledge came from Ptolemaic Egypt, Haycock argues against this claim, instead suggesting that since the elephants Ptolemy II seized in 279-274 would appear to have been tame; wild ones would hardly have drawn carts through crowded streets. All modern attempts to train the African elephant have shown it is a very slow and laborious task, so it is unlikely the Ptolemies could have completed it in time for victory celebrations. This view is supported by the classist E.E Rice in her brief monograph on Ptolemy's grand procession.

( Landmarks in Cushite History pg 230, 232, The grand procession of Ptolemy pg 90-92)

Furthermore, the chute and corral method of trapping was also used in Nubia until quite recent times. A deep gorge leading to an enclosed valley was selected in elephant country and its upper end barricaded. Cavalry and spearmen drove herds of elephants into the gorge, crowding them towards the upper end. The narrow neck of the gorge would them be barricaded. Using trained elephants the ropers then rode in, as in the Keddah system in India, roping the younger animals and calves by the feet.

(Ptolemy II and the Hunting of African elephants pg 250)

While the trade of war elephants would lose its significance after the decisive battle of Raphia in 217 BC, where Antiochus III’s Indian elephants prevailed over the African elephants , the trade or rather exchange of the ivory of the African elephant continued to be equally important for both partners. The Meroitic rulers oversaw a period of remarkable prosperity which was fuelled, in part, by this ivory trade.

(Between two worlds pg 384-385, 391)

Watercolour copy of a meroitic wall painting representing a youth carrying two elephants,found at a palace in Meroe, dated to the 2nd-3rd century CE. image by L. Torok.

Unfortunately, while depictions of elephants with riding gear in military contexts provide evidence that Kushites likely kept war elephants, Pliny's account doesn't contain specific details about the process of elephant taming and utilization in Kush itself, other than providing detailed descriptions of these processes in unspecified places in Africa and India, as well as in Roman territories.

The only textural account directly describing the use of war elephants comes from a semi-legendary account by the 3rd century written Heliodorus called 'Aethiopica', which describes a battle in which Persian cataphracts charged at an army of Aethiopians (ie: Kushites).

"The main point of resistance, some way back, was a line of armoured elephants carrying on their backs towers manned by bowmen .... The orders to the forward troops were to slip between the horses' legs of the attacking cataphracts and to rip open their bellies .... Nevertheless many of the cataphracts succeeded in getting

through this first line of defence and bore down on the elephants; but they were met by such a cloud of arrows aimed at their eyes that most of them were soon immobilized, and the survivors, having tried in vain to break through the solid barrier presented by the bodies of the elephants, retired in disorder."

The troops behind the elephants then counterattacked to eliminate the cavalry. These African elephants may represent the last of the Kushite military pachyderms, as the kingdom would collapse in 360 CE, shortly after an Aksumite invasion.

(War Elephants pg 171)

Elephants and lions (representing the lion god Apedemack) at the temple of Musawwarat. Image by Hintze Fritz

The war elephants of Aksum.

The Aksumite heartland lay far beyond the range of the Ptolemaic hunters mentioned above, however, historical evidence for the presence of elephants in the Aksumite heartland is plentiful. Large herds of elephants were reported in central Tigray and south-central Eritrea in western-Roman and Byzantine accounts from the 1st and 6th centuries, and artistic representations suggest that they were still familiar to the region’s inhabitants long afterwards.

Further to the west, they survived even longer: during the second half of the 19th century, elephants were still plentiful in the frontier area between Sudan and Ethiopia, while they were recorded in the late-20th century in the extreme southwest of Eritrea, barely 150 km west of Aksum.

(Foundations of an African civilization pg 71)

Like in ancient Kush, ivory was important to the Aksumite economy, being consumed by local elites and forming one of the main commodities exported by the Aksumites.

Two accounts from the 1st century CE mention that Aksum was the collecting point of ivory brought from the Ethiopian interior and sent to the port town of Adulis, from where it was exported. Archaeological finds from Aksumite tombs include intricately carved ivory figurines and objects that served as grave goods, and Byzantine ivory artefacts were carved with elephants from Africa rather than India.

(The Elephants of Aksum pg 174, Foundations of an African civilization pg 172-173, 195-196)

Accounts of the taming and use of elephants in Aksum are even more fragmentary than those of Kush. The Aksumite inscriptions of the military campaigns of 4th century king Ezana mention the likely presence of a mounted elephant unit known as sarwē dākwēn or sarwē dākēn, which literally translates to “Elephant troops,” that is derived from the Sāho word dakano or “elephant.”

(The Elephants of Aksum pg 179-180, n. 50,Ancient and Medieval Ethiopian history to 1270 pg 95)

The account of Nonnus, the Byzantine ambassador to Aksum in 530 indicates that elephant-protection measures put in place by Aksumite rulers at the time:

“On the road leading to Axum at the place called Aua, Nonnus and his fellow travelers saw an unusual phenomenon: this was a multitude of elephants, about five thousand. They were pastured in a broad field. None of the natives was allowed to come close to them nor to drive them from the pasture”.

(Foundations of an African civilization pg 210, Elephants in Ancient Egypt and Nubia pg 242)

Elephants appear frequently in accounts of Aksumite-Byzantine diplomacy. An elephant was sent in 496 to Emperor Anastasius (491-518) by the king of Aksum. It was transported through the port of Ayla and crossed the desert to Gaza.

Iohannes Malalas's account about the reception of an Byzantine embassy in Aksum in 531 notes that the Aksumite ruler “ stood on top of four elephants which had a yoke and four discs, and upon them something like a tall carriage covered with gold leaf” Malalas also mentions the arrival at Constantinople of an Aksumite ambassador with an elephant around 549/550 CE.

The text is not wholly clear as to whether the emperor stood on a platform supported by four elephants or in a carriage pulled by them as was common among Hellenistic and Roman rulers and royal imagery.

(Les expeditions militaires pg 1327-31, Foundations of an African civilization pg 86, n. 37)

Contradicting the above accounts is the claim by Cosmas Indicopleustes, who also travelled to Aksum during the 6th century and reported that “the Ethiopians do not understand the art of taming elephants. But, should the king wish to have one or two for show, they capture them when young and subject them to training”

Cosmas' statement about Aksumites not knowing how to tame elephants, yet knowing how to train them, may seem less contradictory if he was referring to the relatively small scale of Elephant taming in Aksum compared to India, which he also visited.

(The elephants of Aksum pg 178)

War elephants of Aksum were most famously at Mecca in the invasion of the city by the Aksumite & Himyarite ruler Abraha, known in later accounts as The ‘Elephant’ campaign, also echoed in the Qurʾān; surah 105:

"Have you not seen how your Lord dealt with the Elephant Men?

Did He not turn their scheme into confusion?

Did He not send flying birds against them,

throwing stones of clay at them,

so thatyour Lord made them like devoured foliage"

Recent discoveries of epigraphic and literary evidence for Abraha's campaigns across Arabia during the 6th century include an invasion of the region of Medina. However, these inscriptions unsurprisingly only recount successful campaigns rather than defeats, so descriptions of Abraha's use of war elephants --where his army was defeated-- come from epigraphic evidence and later Arabic sources, which were nevertheless based on earlier accounts.

(Abraha et la Reconquete pg 33-51, Les expeditions militaires pg 1324)

For example, according to the 14th century account of Ibn Kathīr :

"He [Abrahā] took along a great, powerful elephant that had a huge body the like of which had never been seen before. This elephant was called Mahmūd and it was sent to Abrahā from An-Najāshi, the king of Abyssinia [Aksum], particularly for this expedition. It has also been said that he had eight other elephants with him; their number was also reported to be twelve, plus the large one, Mahmūd. . . . "

This account is based on numerous older accounts contained in Arabic poems from the 8th-12th century, some of which are "secular" accounts, such as the genealogist Al-Zubayr ibn Bakkar (d. 870) who mentions that the "time of the Elephant" was used as a chronological marker by the Quraysh tribe of the prophet before his death.

(The Elephants of Aksum pg 170-171, Les expeditions militaires pg 1332-1338)

Many of the elements of the narrative about the campaign were thus likely based on pre-existing tradition about the Aksumite presence in Arabia and their likely use of war elephants, if only in symbolic functions.

Abraha’s attack on Mecca, from a 17th or 18th century manuscript copy of “The Book of Wonders of the Age” (St Andrews University Library)

14th-century Persian illustration of Abraha on his attempted destruction of the Kaaba, taken from a "Tarikhnama" . image from Wikimedia Commons.

The latter perspective is partially corroborated by the presence of three rock engravings from the Nājran region at Ḥimà, and in the Ḥijāz region at d’al-ʿUlā, which depict an elephant and accompanying mahout, which are said to be dated to this period.

The three engravings likely represent the same elephant which passed through the region and aroused intense curiosity. According to Arab-Muslim scholarly tradition, three Aksumite rulers of Arabia owned an elephant: Aryāṭ, Abraha, and his son Masrūq.

The best candidate for the title of owner of the Himà elephant is Abraha: he is the only historical personage associated with an elephant (by Arab tradition) and attested to Himà (by an inscription). It may be added that when Abraha paraded at Himà with an elephant, it was probably during an expedition to desert Arabia, although not necessary to Mecca.

(Les expeditions militaires pg 1363-1365)

rock engravings from Ḥimà, and d’al-ʿUlā depicting elephants. images by C. Robin

Arabian petroglyph of elephant with mahout (drawing by M. Charles after the first photograph by C. Robin)

The war elephants of Ethiopia and Sudan during the middle ages and early modern period.

The above evidence therefore speaks to Aksumite and Kushite interest in taming elephants, aside from being sources of ivory. Although it appears that elephants were indeed used by the kings of Aksum, its unclear whether they were deployed regularly in combat. This is likely because the practice of using war elephants was intermittent, rather than continuous as was the case for horses. And may explain why later accounts of elephants in post-Aksumite Ethiopia and post-Kushite Sudan are equally fragmentary.

For example, in a land grant to the Ethiopian monastery of Däbrä Ḥayq Ǝsṭifanos in Amhara, the 14th century emperor ʿAmdä Ṣəyon chronicled the territories he had subjugated in 1316/17 CE, and mentioned that: "And I, King Amdä-Siyon went to the sea of Eritrea. When I reached there I mounted on an elephant and entered the sea. And I took up my arrow and spears and killed my enemy, and I saved my people"

(A companion to medieval Ethiopian and Eritrea pg 65, 69)

During the reign of King Iyasus I (1680–1704) the Jesuits, anxious to recover their lost prestige, made two attempts to establish diplomatic relations between the courts of Abyssinia and Louis XIV of France. The Ethiopian envoy brought gifts that included a young elephant, unfortunately, all were lost on the way to the French court.

(Elephants in Ancient Egypt and Nubia pg 242)

Elephants appear extensively in ethiopian art, especially in regard to elephant hunting, which was a common royal tradition. Its however unclear whether the few depictions of elephants with saintly riders are associated with christian figures in India or based on riders from Ethiopia. M. Charles favours the former argument, based on the depiction of the size of the ears and head, however, Ethiopian depictions of elephants typically show them with relatively small ears, so the depictions maybe stylised images of African elephants.

(The elephants of Aksum pg 176-177)

Ethiopian depiction of an elephant from the cave-set church of Mika’el Debra Selam, Ethiopia.

Painting depicting Elephant hunting, inventoried in 1930 at Quai branly museum.

In the Funj kingdom of Sennar, in Sudan, the Ottoman traveller Evliya Celebi, who reportedly visited the kingdom in 1672, mentioned that war elephants were used extensively in the kingdom. He mentioned that the Funj governor of Hafir al-Kabir had an army that included "70 elephants loaded with tents and pavilions." and that his deputy governor had an elephant foal in his palace that was "very tame and friendly, that played games with everybody"

He later describes a battle in which war elephants were used by the Funj armies along side camels and horses, and that the Funj sultan himself and some of his armies rode elephants. He also mentions the Funj rulers allowed elephants to pasturing in specific fields under the watchful eyes of their mahouts, which is similar to Nonnus' description of Aksumite practices.

(Ottoman Explorations of the Nile pg 254-255, 261, 267, 281, 291)

However, some scholars, such as A.C. S. Peacock, consider Celebi's account of his visit to the Funj kingdom as doubtful, arguing that it was likely based on information collected in Egypt from traders who had visited Funj territory.

Its unclear whether the unreliability of Celebi's account included the section on elephants, because the account of the Scottish traveller James Bruce, who also passed through Sennar about a century after Celebi, doesn't mention the presence of trained elephants in the Funj king's army. James Bruce does however, mention that tame lions were kept near the palace by the Sultans, including two lions that were owned by the Funj aristocrat called Shekh Adelan, which were "kept with his horses at grass in the sands but three miles from Sennaar"

(Travels between the Years 1765 and 1773, Chapter VII-VIII )

The 1851 account of the north-African traveller, Muḥammad al-Tūnisī, whose visit to the kingdom of Darfur during the 1820s is accepted by most historians, contains an anecdote about the sultan Tayrab of Darfur (r. 1752-1785) gifting an elephant to a group of tributary Arabs to feed and raise. The elephant consumed so much that the Arabs thought about returning it, but the messenger they sent became terrified of the sultan and ironically returned with another elephant, much to the dismay of his peers.

While al-Tunisi makes no mention of elephants at the court of Darfur, this fragmentary reference may reflect the animal's symbolic importance to the people of the region, especially in connection with emphasizing the "imposing and terrific appearance" of the kings, which was the key lesson behind the anecdote.

(Travels of an Arab Merchant in Soudan pg 267-269)

Conclusion: on the taming of wild animals in African history.

The historical evidence outlined above indicates that the societies of Nubia and Ethiopia engaged in the taming and use of elephants, not just for symbolic reasons, but also for functional reasons, primarily as war elephants.

While its unlikely that the armies of Kush or Aksum employed the use of war elephants as frequently as the ancient Ptolemies or the Indians, the fragmentary references to trained elephants in both kingdoms, combined with the artistic depictions of elephants by Kushite artists leave little doubt that the peoples of this region were familiar with tame elephants.

This, and other evidence such as the leopards of Benin and the animal menagerie of Buganda, indicate that Africans likely attempted to domesticate their numerous wild animals, even though only a handful of them: donkeys, cattle, guinea-fowls, (and possibly dogs and cats) would eventually be sucessfully domesticated.

References:

War Elephants by John M. Kistler

The grand procession of Ptolemy Philadelphus by E.E. Rice

Between two worlds by L. Torok.

Foundations of an African civilization by D. W. Phillipson

Ancient and Medieval Ethiopian history to 1270 by Sergew Hable Selassie

A companion to medieval Ethiopian and Eritrea, edited by S. Kelly

Ottoman Explorations of the Nile by Robert Dankoff et. Al.

Travels between the Years 1765 and 1773 by James Bruce

The Kingdom of Kush: The Napatan and Meroitic Empires By D. Welsby

Oxford handbook of ancient Nubia edited by B. Williams.

Hellenising art in Ancient Nubia by L. Torok