DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.11714#0030
IS
PHACUSA, GOSHEN, RAMSES.
belong. Thus, while the Hebrew text is vague
and says : " Jacob sent Judah before him unto
Joseph, to show the way before him unto Goshen,"
the Septuagint are more precise. They desire
to record the tradition of their time, and to fix
the place where father and son met together.1
This place is Heroopolis, which might be said
to belong to the land of Ramses, for we know
how much Rameses II. had done for Pithom
Heroopolis. If, on the contrary, the Septuagint
had said that it was in the land of Teae^, they
would have made a topographical error, for
Tecrefi would not have accorded with the ad-
ministrative division of the Delta in their time.
"We have next to consider what the land of
Goshen was in the time of the Israelites, and
under the Nineteenth Dynasty. The first im-
portant fact to be noted is that in the most
ancient extant lists of nomes, which are those
of the time of Seti I.,2 the nome of Arabia does
not occur; also we find only fifteen nomes of
Lower Egypt, instead of twenty-two, as under
the Ptolemies.3 The lists of Seti I. end with
the nome of Heliopolis, and do not mention
either the Bubastite (Zagazig) or the Athribite
(Benha) nome—a circumstance which shows
that this part of the kingdom was then not yet
organized in provinces with a settled adminis-
tration, each nome having its capital and its
government. Instead of nomes we find names
of branches of the Nile, or of marsh-lands. We
may therefore conclude that at the time when
1 Tbv St 'lovSav airi&TeiXtv ifXTrpocrdev avTov irpos 'Iwar/fp,
crvvavTrj crcu avrw kclQ' r]p<!>u>v ttoXiv, eis yrjv 'FajxeacrTj. Gen.
xlvi. 28.
3 Duem. Geogr. Insehr. i. 92.
3 Diodorus (i. 54) says that the king Sesoosis (Sesostris)
divided Egypt into thirty-six nomes, and established a
governor over each. Whether we are here to consider
Sesoosis as meaning Rameses II. or not, it is a fact that
under the reign of his father, Seti I., Egypt was divided
into thirty-seven nomes ; and that from that time to the reign
of the Ptolemies and the Romans, the number of the nomes
of Lower Egypt varied, and were increased to twenty-two or
twenty-three, according to the time, making for the whole
of Egypt forty-four or forty-five.
the Israelites settled in Egypt under the last
Hyksos kings, the land of Goshen was an
uncultivated district, not divided among Egyp-
tian inhabitants regularly settled and governed;
but probably a kind of waste land, sufficiently
watered to produce good pasturage. Thus it
was a district which might be assigned to
foreigners without despoiling the inhabitants of
the country. Like the east in general, Goshen
was under the protection of Sopt.
That Barneses II. was a devotee of Sopt, and
that he gave to this god a very high place
among the divinities of Egypt, is also a well-
established fact. On a wall in the temple of
Karnak,4 there is a bas-relief sculpture which
represents Barneses II., with uplifted mace,
striking down a number of foreign captives
which are brought to him by two gods, Amon,
who is of colossal proportions, being the god of
Thebes, and Sopt, the Lord of the East. Know-
ing, as we do, the magnificence of Barneses II.,
and his taste for large buildings, we may
reasonably conclude that he did for Sopt what
he did for Amon, and that he erected in his
honour a temple and a city which afterwards
became Phacusa. This seems all the more
probable, since there still remain upon the spot
some fragments of a colossal statue of Barneses,
indicating a construction of importance.
That the country for some distance around
Sopt should be called Bamses, whether he
organized the nomes or not, is not extra-
ordinary. This part of Egypt seems, in fact,
to have been the favourite residence of the great
Pharaoh. "We have seen that his cartouche
is found in most parts of the Eastern Delta.
Tanis, Pithom, Sopt, Bubastis, Heliopolis, and
the sites now occupied by the Tells of Kantir,
Khataanah, Fakoos, Horbeit, and Botab, all
. bear witness to that ambition of an earthly
immortality which caused him to sculpture his
name throughout this part of the country.
i Leps. Denkm. iii. 144.
PHACUSA, GOSHEN, RAMSES.
belong. Thus, while the Hebrew text is vague
and says : " Jacob sent Judah before him unto
Joseph, to show the way before him unto Goshen,"
the Septuagint are more precise. They desire
to record the tradition of their time, and to fix
the place where father and son met together.1
This place is Heroopolis, which might be said
to belong to the land of Ramses, for we know
how much Rameses II. had done for Pithom
Heroopolis. If, on the contrary, the Septuagint
had said that it was in the land of Teae^, they
would have made a topographical error, for
Tecrefi would not have accorded with the ad-
ministrative division of the Delta in their time.
"We have next to consider what the land of
Goshen was in the time of the Israelites, and
under the Nineteenth Dynasty. The first im-
portant fact to be noted is that in the most
ancient extant lists of nomes, which are those
of the time of Seti I.,2 the nome of Arabia does
not occur; also we find only fifteen nomes of
Lower Egypt, instead of twenty-two, as under
the Ptolemies.3 The lists of Seti I. end with
the nome of Heliopolis, and do not mention
either the Bubastite (Zagazig) or the Athribite
(Benha) nome—a circumstance which shows
that this part of the kingdom was then not yet
organized in provinces with a settled adminis-
tration, each nome having its capital and its
government. Instead of nomes we find names
of branches of the Nile, or of marsh-lands. We
may therefore conclude that at the time when
1 Tbv St 'lovSav airi&TeiXtv ifXTrpocrdev avTov irpos 'Iwar/fp,
crvvavTrj crcu avrw kclQ' r]p<!>u>v ttoXiv, eis yrjv 'FajxeacrTj. Gen.
xlvi. 28.
3 Duem. Geogr. Insehr. i. 92.
3 Diodorus (i. 54) says that the king Sesoosis (Sesostris)
divided Egypt into thirty-six nomes, and established a
governor over each. Whether we are here to consider
Sesoosis as meaning Rameses II. or not, it is a fact that
under the reign of his father, Seti I., Egypt was divided
into thirty-seven nomes ; and that from that time to the reign
of the Ptolemies and the Romans, the number of the nomes
of Lower Egypt varied, and were increased to twenty-two or
twenty-three, according to the time, making for the whole
of Egypt forty-four or forty-five.
the Israelites settled in Egypt under the last
Hyksos kings, the land of Goshen was an
uncultivated district, not divided among Egyp-
tian inhabitants regularly settled and governed;
but probably a kind of waste land, sufficiently
watered to produce good pasturage. Thus it
was a district which might be assigned to
foreigners without despoiling the inhabitants of
the country. Like the east in general, Goshen
was under the protection of Sopt.
That Barneses II. was a devotee of Sopt, and
that he gave to this god a very high place
among the divinities of Egypt, is also a well-
established fact. On a wall in the temple of
Karnak,4 there is a bas-relief sculpture which
represents Barneses II., with uplifted mace,
striking down a number of foreign captives
which are brought to him by two gods, Amon,
who is of colossal proportions, being the god of
Thebes, and Sopt, the Lord of the East. Know-
ing, as we do, the magnificence of Barneses II.,
and his taste for large buildings, we may
reasonably conclude that he did for Sopt what
he did for Amon, and that he erected in his
honour a temple and a city which afterwards
became Phacusa. This seems all the more
probable, since there still remain upon the spot
some fragments of a colossal statue of Barneses,
indicating a construction of importance.
That the country for some distance around
Sopt should be called Bamses, whether he
organized the nomes or not, is not extra-
ordinary. This part of Egypt seems, in fact,
to have been the favourite residence of the great
Pharaoh. "We have seen that his cartouche
is found in most parts of the Eastern Delta.
Tanis, Pithom, Sopt, Bubastis, Heliopolis, and
the sites now occupied by the Tells of Kantir,
Khataanah, Fakoos, Horbeit, and Botab, all
. bear witness to that ambition of an earthly
immortality which caused him to sculpture his
name throughout this part of the country.
i Leps. Denkm. iii. 144.