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camel corps at Beersheba
Beersheba

Beersheba is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. Often referred to as the "Capital of the Negev", it is the seventh-largest city in Israel with a population of 186,100....
 during the First Suez Offensive
First Suez Offensive

The First Suez Offensive was between Ottoman Empire and British Empire in Sinai and Palestine Campaign of the World War I, which the Ottoman offensive to capture the Suez Canal in Egypt ended with their withdrawal....
 of World War I
World War I

World War I, or the First World War , was a global military conflict which involved the Great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War I and the Central Powers....
, 1915.]] Camel cavalry, or camelry, is a generic designation for armed forces
Armed forces

The armed forces of a country are its government-sponsored defense, fighting forces, and organizations. They exist to further the foreign and domestic policies of their governing body, and to defend that body and the nation it represents from external and internal aggressors....
 using camel
Camel

Camels are even-toed ungulates within the genus Camelus. The dromedary, one-humped or Arabian camel has a single hump and is well known for its healthy low fat milk, and the Bactrian camel has two humps....
s as a means of transportation. Sometimes warriors or soldiers of this type also fought from camel-back with spears, bows or rifles.

Camel cavalry were a common element in desert warfare throughout history due in part due to the animal's high level of adaptability.






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camel corps at Beersheba
Beersheba

Beersheba is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. Often referred to as the "Capital of the Negev", it is the seventh-largest city in Israel with a population of 186,100....
 during the First Suez Offensive
First Suez Offensive

The First Suez Offensive was between Ottoman Empire and British Empire in Sinai and Palestine Campaign of the World War I, which the Ottoman offensive to capture the Suez Canal in Egypt ended with their withdrawal....
 of World War I
World War I

World War I, or the First World War , was a global military conflict which involved the Great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War I and the Central Powers....
, 1915.]] Camel cavalry, or camelry, is a generic designation for armed forces
Armed forces

The armed forces of a country are its government-sponsored defense, fighting forces, and organizations. They exist to further the foreign and domestic policies of their governing body, and to defend that body and the nation it represents from external and internal aggressors....
 using camel
Camel

Camels are even-toed ungulates within the genus Camelus. The dromedary, one-humped or Arabian camel has a single hump and is well known for its healthy low fat milk, and the Bactrian camel has two humps....
s as a means of transportation. Sometimes warriors or soldiers of this type also fought from camel-back with spears, bows or rifles.

Camel cavalry were a common element in desert warfare throughout history due in part due to the animal's high level of adaptability. They provided a mobile element better suited to work and survive in an arid and waterless environment than the horses of conventional cavalry. The smell of the camel according to folklore alarms and disorients horses, making camels an effective anti-cavalry weapon. For this purpose Emperor Claudius is said to have brought a detachment of camel cavalry as part of his invasion force for conquering Britain
Roman conquest of Britain

By AD 43, the time of the main Roman invasion of Britain, Great Britain had already frequently been the target of invasions, planned and actual, by forces of the Roman Republic and Roman Empire....
. The camel was used in this way by many civilizations, especially in Arabia and North Africa
North Africa

North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, separated by the Sahara from Sub-Saharan Africa.Geopolitically, the United Nations subregion of Northern Africa includes the following seven countries or territories:...
. The Arab
Arab

An Arab is a person who Identity as such on linguistic or cultural grounds. The plural form, Arabs , refers to the Ethnocultural group at large....
s used camels to great effect against their horse-mounted Europe
Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
an enemies during the Muslim conquests
Muslim conquests

Arab Muslim conquests , also referred to as the Islamic conquests or Arab conquests, began after the death of the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
. During the late nineteenth and much of the twentieth centuries camel troops were used for desert policing and patrol work in the British, French, German, Spanish and Italian colonial armies. Descendents of such units still form part of the modern Indian, Moroccan and Egyptian armies.

History


Earliest Usage


The first recorded use of the camel as a military animal occurred during the Battle of Thymbra
Battle of Thymbra

The Battle of Thymbra was the decisive battle in the war between Croesus of the Lydia against Cyrus the Great in the first months of 547 BC. Cyrus, having pursued Croesus into Lydia following the drawn Battle of Pteria, met the remains of Croesus' partly disbanded army in battle on the plain north of Sardis....
 in 547 BC, fought between Cyrus the Great
Cyrus the Great

Cyrus the Great , , also known as Cyrus II of Persia and Cyrus the Elder, was a Persian people Shah . He was the founder of the Persian Empire under the Achaemenid dynasty, an empire, perhaps the most wealthy and magnificent in history....
 of Persia and Croesus
Croesus

Croesus was the Monarch of Lydia from 560/561 BC until his defeat by the Persian Empire in about 547 BC. The fall of Croesus made a profound impact on the Greeks, providing a fixed point in their calendar....
 of Lydia
Lydia

Lydia was an Iron Age kingdom of western Asia Minor located generally east of ancient Ionia in the modern Turkey provinces of Manisa Province and inland Izmir Province....
. According to Xenophon
Xenophon

Xenophon , son of Gryllus, of the deme Erchia of Athens, also known as Xenophon of Athens and Xenophon of Thebes, was a soldier, mercenary and a contemporary and admirer of Socrates....
, Cyrus' cavalry were outnumbered by as much as six to one. Acting on information from one of his generals that the Lydian horses shied away from camels, Cyrus formed the camels from his baggage train into the first Camel Corps in history. Although not technically employed as cavalry, they were crucial in panicking the Lydian cavalry and turning the battle in Cryus' favor. There is a reference in historical records to the Arab king Gindibu employing as many as 1000 camels at the Battle of Qarqar
Battle of Qarqar

The Battle of Karkar was fought in 853 BC when the army of Assyria, led by king Shalmaneser III, encountered an allied army of 12 kings at Karkar led by Hadadezer of Aram Damascus and King Ahab of Kingdom of Israel....
 in 853 B.C., although it is not clear how they were employed during the battle.

Un Soldiers in Eritrea

See also

  • méhariste
    Mehariste

    M?hariste is a French language word that roughly translates to camel cavalry. The word is most commonly used as a designation of military units....
  • zaptié
    Zaptié

    Zapti? was the designation given to locally raised gendarmerie units in the Italian colonies of Tripolitania, Cyrenaica, Eritrea and Somalia between 1889 and 1942....
  • zumbooruck
    Zumbooruck

    A zumbooruck was a specialized form of camel cavalry and mobile artillery from the early modern era. The operator of a zumbooruck is known as a zumboorukchee or zamburakchi....
  • Bikaner Camel Corps
    Bikaner Camel Corps

    The Bikaner Camel Cops was a military unit from India that fought for the allies in World War I and World War II.The Corps was founded by Maharaja Ganga Singh of the Indian state of Bikaner, as the Ganga Risala after the British government of India accepted his offer to raise a force of 500 soldiers....
  • Imperial Camel Corps
    Imperial Camel Corps

    The Imperial Camel Corps was a brigade-sized military formation which fought for the Allies of World War I in the Sinai and Palestine Campaign in World War I....
  • Somaliland Camel Corps
    Somaliland Camel Corps

    The Somaliland Camel Corps was a unit of the British Army based in British Somaliland.Camels are a necessity in Somalia, being as important as ponies in Mongolia....
  • U.S. Camel Corps
  • Sudan Defence Force
    Sudan Defence Force

    The Sudan Defence Force was a Military of Sudan formed in 1925, as its name indicates, to maintain the borders of the Sudan under the British administration....
  • Tropas Nomadas
    Tropas Nómadas

    The Tropas N?madas were an auxiliary regiment to the colonialism Military of Spain in Spanish Sahara , from the 1930s until the end of the Spain presence in the territory in 1975....