Brugsch, Heinrich: Egypt under the pharaohs: a history derived entirely from the monuments (London, 1891)

318 THE PHARAOH OF THE EXODUS OH. xni.

feed their herds on the possessions of Pharaoh, who is there a
beneficent sun for all peoples. In the year 8 . . . . Set, I caused
them to be conducted, according to the list of the .... for
the .... of the other names of the days, on which the for-
tress (Khetam) of Meneptah-Hotephima is opened for their
passage.

As Eamses II. must be regarded as the Pharaoh
under whom Moses first saw the light, so the chrono-
logical relations—having regard to the great age of the
two contemporaries, Eamses II. and Moses—demand
that Meneptah II. should in all probability be acknow-
ledged as the Pharaoh of the Exodus. He also had
his royal seat in the city of Eamses, and seems to have
strengthened its fortifications. Per-ao—' great house,'
' high gate '■—is, according to the monuments, the
designation of the king of the land of Egypt for the
time being. This does not of itself furnish a decisive
argument; but then, besides, the incidental statement
of the Psalmist, that Moses wrought his wonders in the
field of Zoan (Psalm lxxviii. 43), carries us back again
to those sovereigns, Eamses II. and Meneptah, who
were fond of holding their court in Zoan-Eamses.

Some scholars have recently sought to recognise in
the Hebrews the so-called Aper, Apura, or Aperiu,
the Erythraean people in the east of the nome of
Heliopolis, in what is known as the ' red country' or
the ' red mountain;' and hence they have drawn
conclusions which rest on a weak foundation. Accord-
ing to the inscriptions, the name of this people appears
in connection with the breeding- of horses and the art
of horsemanship. In an historical narrative of the
time of Tehuti-mes HI. the Apura are named as horsemen
or knights (seneri), who mount their horses at the king's
command. In another document, of the time of
Eamses in., long after the Exodus of the Jews from
Egypt, 2,083 Aperiu are introduced, as settlers in