te throne by his son
Mutallu, whom the Egyptians referred to as "Metella" or "Mautinel". He
was a vigorous and aggressive monarch, and appears to have lost no
time in compelling the Amorites to throw off their allegiance to Egypt
and recognize him as their overlord. As a result, when Rameses II
ascended the Egyptian throne he had to undertake the task of winning
back the Asiatic possessions of his father.

The preliminary operations conducted by Rameses on the Palestinian
coast were attended with much success. Then, in his fifth year, he
marched northward with a great army, with purpose, it would appear, to
emulate the achievements of Thothmes III and win fame as a mighty
conqueror. But he underestimated the strength of his rival and
narrowly escaped disaster. Advancing impetuously, with but two of his
four divisions, he suddenly found himself surrounded by the army of
the wily Hittite, King Mutallu, in the vicinity of the city of Kadesh,
on the Orontes. His first division remained intact, but his second was
put to flight by an intervening force of the enemy. From this perilous
position Rameses extricated himself by leading a daring charge against
the Hittite lines on the river bank, which proved successful. Thrown
into confusion, his enemies sought refuge in the city, but the Pharaoh
refrained from attacking them there.

Although Rameses boasted on his return home of having achieved a great
victory, there is nothing more certain than that this campaign proved
a dismal failure. He was unable to win back for Egypt the northern
territories which had acknowledged the suzerainty of Egypt during the
Eighteenth Dynasty. Subsequently he was kept fully engaged in
maintaining his prestige in northern Palestine and the vicinity of
Phoenicia. Then his Asiatic military operations, which extended
altogether over a period of about twenty years, were brought to a
close in a dramatic and unexpected manner. The Hittite king Mutallu
had died in battle, or by the hand of an assassin, and was succeeded
by his brother Hattusil II (Khetasar), who sealed a treaty of peace
with the great Rameses.

An Egyptian copy of this interesting document can still be read on the
walls of a Theban temple, but it is lacking in certain details which
interest present-day historians. No reference, for instance, is made
to the boundaries of the Egyptian Empire in Syria, so that it is
impossible to estimate the degree of success which attended the
campaigns