Rameses
From BibleWiki
"the land of" (Gen 47:11), was probably "the land of Goshen" Gen 45:10. After the Hebrews had built Rameses, one of the "treasure cities," it came to be known as the "land" in which that city was built.
The city bearing this name (Ex 12:37) was probably identical with Zoan, which Rameses II. ("son of the sun") rebuilt. It became his special residence, and ranked next in importance and magnificance to Thebes. Huge masses of bricks, made of Nile mud, sun-dried, some of them mixed with stubble, possibly moulded by Jewish hands, still mark the site of Rameses. This was the general rendezvous of the Israelites before they began their march out of Egypt. Called also Raamses (Ex 1:11).
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Egyptian city; one of the "treasure cities" built by the Israelites in their servitude (Ex. i. 11: "Raamses"); the point from which they started on their journey through the wilderness (Ex. xii. 37). Further, the northeast division of Egypt contained a region known as the "land of Rameses" (Gen. xlvii. 11). There the migrating Israelites were settled, "in the land of Goshen" (Gen. xlvi. 34, xlvii. 4, et al.). The addition of the Septuagint to Gen. xlvi. 28—"to the city Heroopolis," preceding the words "into the land of Goshen"—seems to include the city of Pithom (Heropolis, Heroo[n]polis) in this region, while the passages concerning Rameses as the starting-point of the Exodus extend its boundary so far to the east that "land of Goshen" and "land of Rameses" would seem to be synonymous. The latter name seems to be derived from the famous King Rameses II., who, by digging a canal and founding cities, extended the cultivable land of Goshen, formerly limited to the country at the mouth of the modern Wadi Ṭumilat, over the whole valley to the Bitter Lakes. Less probable is it that the "land of Rameses" is to be limited to that part of the region that was newly colonized by Rameses II.
The city of Rameses betrays its builder and the date of its foundation by its name; from Ex. xii. 37 and Num. xxxiii. 8, 5 it may be concluded that it was situated one day's journey west of Succoth—the modern Tell al-Maskhutah or its vicinity. Consequently it ought to be not far from the entrance into the Wadi Ṭumilat, near the modern Tell al-Kabir. There is, however, so far, no epigraphic support for this assumption, and the various ruins identified with Rameses (Tell Abu Sulaiman; Tell al-Maskhutah; see above for its identity with Succoth) have not confirmed it. The inscriptions of Rameses II. mention various colonies—one being called "House of Rameses," in Nubia, not far from Tanis—but only once such a city in or near Goshen. This place, where, in the twenty-first year of Rameses II., the treaty of peace and alliance between Egypt and the Hittites was made, was probably the Biblical Rameses; but an exact determination of its situation can not yet be furnished (comp. Naville, "The Store-City of Pithom and the Route of the Exodus," 1884).
