Poole, Reginald S.: The cities of Egypt (London, 1882)

HANES.

3i

only mentioned in the Bible. In the days of the
supreme struggle with Assyria, Hebrew ambassadors
went thither to beg for Egyptian aid. 'His princes
were at Zoan, and his ambassadors came to Hanes'
(Isa. xxx. 4). The envoys passed on their fruitless
errand through the terrible wilderness, their beasts laden
with costly presents (vers. 5-7). As we read we recog-
nise Zoan, the great frontier-town, the seat in that time
of the Pharaoh who enjoyed the right of descent from
an earlier line that claimed supremacy. The position of
Zoan is fixed in the Bible. Does not the name mean
' the place of departure,' where the caravans left the last
great town of Egypt behind and were soon to enter on
the desert way? Was not Goshen hard by? Zoan
stands out prominent in Egyptian history, like the mighty
ruins which mark her desolate site, from which the story
of forgotten ages has been recovered for these later
times. But what and where was Hanes? The Greek
translators of the Old Testament, labouring in Egypt,
could not tell, the patient Chaldees who paraphrased the
Scripture in the vulgar tongue of Palestine could not
tell. Gesenius, that prince of modern Hebrew scholars,
guessed that Hanes must be the city which the Copts