Short Note on
the findings of H-W Fischer-Elfert regarding the city Pi-Ramesse on an Hieratic
Ostracon. Koot van Wyk The work of H-W
Fischer-Elfert was published in 2016 and it was a study of an ostracon
revealing in Hieratic Egyptian some aspects of the city of Pi-Ramesse. The
author translated the ostracon after a discussion of some unique words, among
them at least two Semitic Egyptianized words related to “trader” = tamkārūtu/a (line
5) and “brickwork” = t3-libnātu (line 3). The dating of
the ostracon is in Late Egyptian due to a word m.im in line 4. The Ostracon
belongs to a genre known in Egypt or in the Levant literature by the Latin name
laud urbis which is literally translated as “praise of a city”. The opposite of
course, not mentioned in this study, is lamentum urbis or the lament over a
city. In his
footnotes he found that the word “heart” is used multiple times in the Egyptian
literature with the laud urbis genre. He also found
that a list of cities are mentioned with the laud urbis genre:
“Further exx.
for the motif of trade and business in the laudes urbium I have noted with
regard to the following cities followed by the names of the authors of the
texts (as long as they are known; cities appearing not
in chronological order): Antiochos –
Libanios (pp. 21ff.) Athens –
Isokrates (pp. 5ff.) Chester –
Lucianus (the longest praise of a city with about 9000 words; p. 62) Jerusalem –
Flavius Josephus (De Bello Judaico II 42-54; 297-308; IV 314; 560-584; Classen, Die
Stadt im Spiegel der Descriptiones, p. 31); al-Muqqadasī (pp. 32f.) Metz – Richer
of Metz (p. 55: urbs populosa satis cum mercibus utilitatis followed by all the
commodities on the local market) Milano –
Bonvesin de la Riva (p. 63) Paris – John of
Jandun (p. 64) Patavia –
Giovanni da Nono (p. 63ff.) Regensburg –
anonymous (p. 49) Roma – Ailios
Aristeides (pp. 18ff.) Tournai – Milo
of St. Amand (p. 44) Tyre – William
of Tyre (p. 33) Verona – Versus
de Verona (p. 40f.) York – Alkuin
(p. 42) See also
Classen, Die Stadt im Spiegel der Descriptiones, nn. 148 and 352 (Constantinople),
196 (Narbonne), 226 and 239 (Alexandria), 241 (on different cities), 388 (Exeter). Adam of Bremen
(before 1050 – 1081/1085 ) describes a nobilissima civitas Iumne = Vineta “rich in
the wares of all the northern nations, that city lacks nothing that is either pleasing
or rare (Urbs illa mercibus omnium septentrionalium nationum locuples,
nichil non habet iocundi aut rari). Unfortunately, the identity of this city could not be
established by now.” (Fischer-Elfert
2016: 217 footnote 59).
What
Fischer-Elfert did not mention is that Ezechiel 28 talks about Tyre in both
laud urbis and lamentum urbis genres. It is a prophetic description of before
and after God’s judgment regarding the city. The role of God in judging cities
is an ongoing theme in the Old Testament connected to cities and places. Even
the pagan religions viewed the fall of a city as the role of the deities. One
can see it in their Fall of a City Hymns of Lamentation genre. If this praise
of the city of Ramesses was since and after the time of Ramesses II, then the
Exodus could not have taken place during the time of Ramesses II. He did not
die in the Red Sea. His body exists and technically and pragmatically he should
not have been found at all. Biblically-chronologically he is nearly 200 years
too late for a date of the Exodus. Trade from and to
Ugarit would have been interrupted and that interruption would show on Wall
Street in Ramesses or the Stock Markets of Ancient Ugarit. It would have been
clearly visible in the texts. The texts in Egypt from 1296-1100 and the texts
from Ugarit 1230-1100 BCE do not indicate any hint of such a major disaster as
Exodus is spelling out. Thus, the city of Exodus 1:11 cannot be the one built by
Pharaoh Ramesses II. It cannot be the one in the laud urbis genre of the
Ostracon discussed by Fischer-Elfert. The translation
of Fischer-Elfert 2016 Hieratic Ostracon is this:
“1) (Oh) you
outpost of all foreign countries, you hinterland 2) of Egypt, you /////
(glazed) tile (libnātu) to my(?) heart. Pleasant 3) is the place of
distribution / market-place with/because of(?) its money there, namely the 4)
vine tendrils(?), business/commerce (tamkārūtu). 5) The chiefs of every foreign
country (usually) come in order to descend 6) with their products”
Source: Hans-Werner
Fischer-Elfert (2016). In Praise of Pi-Ramesse – A perfect trading Center
(including two new Semitic words in syllabic orthography, Ostr. Ashmolean
Museum HO 1187). In Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 242: Aere perennius Mélanges
égyptologiques en l’honneur de Pascal Vernus, edited by P. Collombert, D.
Lefevre, S. Polis and J. Winand. Peeters, pp. 195-218.