The Land of Goshen and the Nile River and Hyksos Who Settled There

 Nadene Goldfoot                                          

                                                                

Goshen:  land where Jacob settled in Egypt.  

It is believed to have been located in the eastern Nile Delta, lower Egypt; perhaps at or near Avaris, the seat of power of the Hyksos kings.  Other maps have

shown it over the Sinai, but this makes more sense being

Rameses and Pithom were built in the area by the Hebrews.

Popular lore suggests the Hyksos, a mysterious group of foreign invaders, conquered the Nile Delta around 1638 B.C. and remained in power until 1530 B.C. But written records of the dynasty are scarce, and modern archaeologists have found few material signs of the ancient military campaign.  Now, new research lends weight to an alternative theory on the Hyksos’ origins. As Colin Barras reports for Science magazine, chemical analysis of skeletons found at the Hyksos capital of Avaris indicates that people from the Levant—an area encompassing the countries surrounding the eastern Mediterranean—immigrated to Egypt centuries before the takeover. The Hyksos dynasty, then, was likely the result of an immigrant uprising, not a hostile outside invasion.  The findings, published in the journal PLOS One, center on variations in strontium isotopes present in 75 skeletons’ tooth enamel. Strontium, a harmless metal found in water, soil and rocks, enters the body primarily through food. Comparing isotope ratios found in enamel, which forms between ages 3 and 8, with those present in a specific region, can help scientists determine whether an individual grew up there, as levels “vary from place to place,” writes Ariel David for Haaretz.  Around half of the skeletons were buried in the 350 years before the Hyksos’ takeover; the rest were interred during the dynasty’s reign. Per the paper, the researchers found that 24 of the pre-1638 skeletons were foreign-born, pointing toward significant immigration prior to the supposed invasion. Doesn't this fit with our history of Abraham, his father and wife leaving Ur for Canaan?  

Arrival of Hyksos who may also have been the Hebrews, thinking of Joseph and his coat of many colors that his father, Jacob had made

Avaris was coincidently the Hyksos capital of Egypt located at the modern site of Tell el-Dab'a in the northeastern region of the Nile Delta. As the main course of the Nile migrated eastward, its position at the hub of Egypt's delta emporia made it a major capital suitable for trade. It was occupied from about the 18th century BCE until its capture by Ahmose I.

"Many of these immigrants were from Palestine and they were culturally Egyptianized, using Egyptian pottery, but also retained many aspects of their own culture, as can be seen from the various Asiatic burials including weapons of Syro-Palestinian origin. One palatial district appears to have been abandoned as a result of an epidemic during the 13th dynasty. Could the living had immunity from this that was passed on to the next generations?   In the 18th century BC, the Hyksos conquered Lower Egypt and set up Avaris as their capital. Kamose, the last pharaoh of the Seventeenth Dynasty, besieged Avaris but was unable to defeat the Hyksos there. A few decades later, Ahmose I captured Avaris and overran the Hyksos. Canaanite-style artifacts dated to the Tuthmosid or New Kingdom period suggest that a large part of the city's Semitic population remained in residence following its reconquest by the Egyptians. The pharaohs of the Eighteenth Dynasty set up a capital in Thebes and the palatial complex at Avaris was briefly abandoned, but areas such as the Temple of Seth and G6 region remained continuously occupied. After Ramesses II constructed the city of Pi-Ramesses roughly 2km to the north and "superseding Avaris", large portions of the former site of Avaris were used by the inhabitants of Pi-Ramesses as a cemetery."

The Nile Delta (Arabic: دلتا النيل, Delta an-Nīl or simply الدلتا, ad-Delta) is the delta formed in Lower Egypt where the Nile River spreads out and drains into the Mediterranean Sea. It is one of the world's largest river deltas—from Alexandria in the west to Port Said in the east, it covers 240 km (150 mi) of Mediterranean coastline and is a rich agricultural region. From north to south the delta is approximately 160 km (100 mi) in length. The Delta begins slightly down-river from Cairo.  The Nile River forms an arcuate delta as it empties into the Mediterranean Sea. Stronger waves form a cuspate delta, which is more pointed than the arcuate delta, and is tooth-shaped.  The terminology "Upper" and "Lower" derives from the flow of the Nile from the highlands of East Africa northwards to the Mediterranean Sea.

A river delta is a landform shaped like a triangle, created by deposition of sediment that is carried by a river and enters slower-moving or stagnant water. This occurs where a river enters an ocean, sea, estuary, lake, reservoir, or (more rarely) another river that cannot carry away the supplied sediment. It is so named because its triangle shape resembles the Greek letter Delta. The size and shape of a delta is controlled by the balance between watershed processes that supply sediment, and receiving basin processes that redistribute, sequester, and export that sediment. The size, geometry, and location of the receiving basin also plays an important role in delta evolution.

River deltas are important in human civilization, as they are major agricultural production centers and population centers. They can provide coastline defense and can impact drinking water supply. They are also ecologically important, with different species' assemblages depending on their landscape position.

                 Pharaohs would have lived at Cairo.                                

The Nile is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa and has historically been considered the longest river in the world, though this has been contested by research suggesting that the Amazon River is slightly longer.

                              Pharaoh Narmer/Menes

Menes was the name of the first Egyptian pharaoh, who supposedly founded the 1st Dynasty after unifying Egypt around 3,200 BCE. That was 5,223 years ago.  According to tradition, joined Upper and Lower Egypt in a single centralized monarchy and established ancient Egypt’s 1st dynasty.

Summary:  Israelites led by Jacob/Israel migrated to Egypt when hit by a terrible drought  when their crops were destroyed.  They had been a people coming from Abraham who lived in Ur of the Chaldees near the delta of the Euphrates River of Mesopotamia.  They settled in Egypt’s Nile Delta in the city of Avaris, where they were identified as the Hyksos people,  a major group of immigrants who also lived in this city.  They did so well tending their sheep that they multiplied faster  than Egyptians, scaring the pharaoh who thought they could turn on them and take over, which the Hyksos managed to do at some point, but at the same time, Jacob/Israel’s descendants were made slaves of Egypt, set to building the storage cities of Pithom and Rameses, also in the Nile Delta.  Passover’s 9 plagues were remnants of the Volcano erupting on the Greek island of Santorini with their effect which also took place on the island as well, with the 10^th most serious plague of the 1^st born sons dying being the most mysterious one.   A possible cause could have been something to do with circumcision, an act Egyptians practiced, which then could have only been with 1^st borns, and in a ceremony using either a special knife, food or drink connected with the act that could have poisoned the 1^st borns.  Circumsion is the only act that would have identified males from females.  Israelites were not circumcising yet, and would receive this act while on the Exodus from Moses’s teachings.   While we don’t know enough about circumcision in Egypt, we do know they practiced it.  

Resource;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nile

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_delta