Israel in Egypt:The Evidence for the Authenticity of the Exodus Tradition by James K. Hoffmeier

Author:James K. Hoffmeier [Hoffmeier, James K.]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 1999-03-18T05:00:00+00:00

Raamses/Ramesses85

Many years ago, Sir Alan Gardiner surveyed the various Egyptian toponyms with the Pharaonic name Ramesses in order to determine which one might be equated with Raamses of Exodus 1:1 1.86 Thanks to the ambitious building ventures of Ramesses II, a number of sites bore his name, stretching from “The Dwelling of Ramesses,” situated somewhere in northern Sinai, to Abu Simbel in the south.87 The full name of the Delta residence of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Dynasties was “House of Ramesses Beloved of Amun, Great of Victories” (pirc mss sw mry imn c3 ntw).88 Built by Ramesses II in the early years of his reign, Pi-Ramesses flourished through the reign of Ramesses VI (1143–1136 B.C.), when it was abandoned owing to the westward migration of the Bubastite branch of the Nile. Gardiner eliminated the southern sites and the one in Sinai as the capital because they were not in the Delta (texts clearly placed it next to the Nile). In his study of 1918, he concluded that Pelusium (Tell Farama) was Ramesses, against Flinders Petrie’s position that it was located in the Wadi Tumilat at Tell el-Retabeh (fig. 2).89 Later on, Gardiner rejected Pelusium in favor of Tanis,90 in the light of French excavations at San el-Hagar by Pierre Montet.91 The impressive Ramesside remains at Tanis led generations of Egyptologists and biblical scholars to identify this site with Pi-Ramesses and the biblical Raamses/Ramesses.92 There was no doubt that the statues, obelisks, and monumental stones that made up the central temple complex were from Pi-Ramesses. The problem remained, however, that no ceramic or stratigraphic evidence for the Ramesside period had appeared at Tanis.

Meanwhile, Mahmud Hamza had been digging a rather unglamorous site at Qantir near the town of Fakus and the site of Tell el-Dabca in the northeastern Delta (fig. 2).93 There he found the foundations of a royal palace and some inscribed Ramesside remains, including hieratic ostracons bearing the name Pi-Ramesses, which led him to suggest that this site was the Delta residence of the Ramessides.94 An important study by William Hayes of glazed tiles from Qantir led him to support Hamza’s identification.95 Subsequent work at the site by Labib Habachi96 and Shehata Adam97 has resulted in the virtual unanimous conclusion that Qantir is Pi-Ramesses.98 As a consequence of the certainty of this identification, a number of Bible atlases now show Raamses/Ramesses at Qantir, not at Tanis.99 Archaeological work at Qantir was recently renewed and is ongoing under the directorship of Edgar Pusch, the German Egyptologist.

With the location of Pi-Ramesses now certain, it might be thought that there would be little doubt that this site is the same as Raamses/Ramesses of the Exodus narratives. However, over thirty years ago, Donald Redford questioned the equation on linguistic grounds.100 He rightly noted that the absence of the element pi requires an explanation, since it was present in the spelling of Pithom in Exodus 1:11.Redford also thought it was problematic that the sibilants in Egyptian “Ramesses” should appear in Hebrew as ss and not šš.

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