Page 200 - Four Thousand Years Ago by Geoffrey Bibby

[1650-1580 b.c.] The Great King 161

product was brittle and could not be wrought. It was inferior to
bronze in every way, only suitable for making occasional rings
and ornaments as a curiosity.
It made little difference to the miners and the smiths, the
farmers and the traders, the carpenters and the potters and the
Stonecutters that they now were the subjects of new and foreign
kings. They were liable to periodic forced labor in state projects,
and occasionally to military service, but that they had always
been. They were still governed by their councils of elders, and
life went on as before. There were perhaps more wars than there
had been, for the new rulers of the cities were no lovers of peace
and strove among themselves to extend their powers and their
lands. The warrior aristocracy, who had come with the princes
and who stood closest to them, had been given large estates and
court titles, and it was they who did most of the fighting, being
liable, in return for their estates, to render military service and
to keep the assigned number of chariots prepared and manned.
But it was not always against rival cities that the fiercest bat­
tles were fought. The newcomers had, it seemed, no fixed order of
succession to the city thrones, and on the death of a king it was
the rule rather than the exception that there be strife between
rival claimants, each supported by a clique of the feudal nobles.
The first Labarnas of Kussara, the father of Hattusilis, had
himself only won the throne after a bitter struggle with his
relative and rival, Papadilmah, but once he was firmly in the
saddle he had succeeded in promoting a harmony among his
large family of brothers, half-brothers, and brothers-in-law which
was already well on the way to being legendary. And he had em­
barked on a career of conquest which had united the greater part
of central Asia Minor for the first time, and had even extended
his sway to the Mediterranean coast to the south. His relatives
and his sons had been appointed viceroys over the conquered
cities, and had held them—it was still remembered with amaze­
ment—without ever questioning his overlordship. And on his
death, only a few years ago, his son, the second Labarnas, who
now called himself Hattusilis, had succeeded to his throne with­
out opposition. Now he, in turn, had extended his frontiers, and
had captured finally the old royal city of the Hatti.