Avaris and Piramesse

932
78d
- ,,
AVARIS AND
PIRAMESSE:
ARCHAEOLOGICAL
EXPLORATION IN THE
EASTERN NILE
DELTA
BY
MANFRED BIETAK
MORTIMER WHEELER
ARCHAEOLOGICAL LECTURE
1979
Reprinted with a revised Postscript and

Bibliography
1986
FROM THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE

BRITISH ACADEMY, LONDON, VOLUME LXV (I979)
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
J. E. COSS LIBRARY
CENTRAL BAPTIST COLLEGE
86051~j
•
ISBN 0 85672 201 4
I© The British Academy 1981
Reprinted with a revised Postscript and

Bibliography
1986
Hobbs the Printers oj Southampton (3372)

MORTIMER WHEELER ARCHAEOLOGICAL LECTURE
AVARIS AND PIRAMESSE

ARCHAEOLOGICAL EXPLORATION IN THE
EASTERN NILE DELTA!
By MANFRED BIETAK
Read 9 May 1979

I Introduction
M ANY events important in the history of Egypt took place

in the eastern Nile Delta. This region received an irre-
gular but nonetheless continuous flow of Asiatic immigrants,
who contributed a distinctly Asiatic element to the life and
customs of the local population,> It also saw the passing of armies
on their way to quell disturbances across its eastern border and
occasionally it benefited from commercial exchange with
western Asia and the Mediterranean world.
More than once in Egypt's history the seat of government
lay in this area: first, during the Hyksos Period, when Egypt
was ruled by kings of Asiatic origin (c. I 650- 1542 BC), then
during the time of the 19th and zoth dynasties (c. 1300-1080 BC)
and, to some extent, during the following Libyan Period.
It is indeed strange that this, from an historical point of
view, most important region has remained largely unexplored
by archaeologists, apart from limited excavations at a few main
sites. Archaeological work is difficult in the Delta for it demands
a more sophisticated excavation technique than that used at the
easily accessible desert sites along the edge of the cultivation
in Upper Egypt with its tombs and temples and its imposing
remains of stone architecture, which provide material suitable
for collections.
I The printed version includes details, which were not mentioned in the
lecture but were evident from the slides. I am very grateful to the British
Academy for publishing this extended version and to Dr I. E. S. Edwards
for his kind assistance in the editing of my English text.
2 R. Giveon, Les bedouins Shosou des documents Egyptiens (Leiden 1971),
pp. 237-69; id., Asiaten, LA I, pp. 461-71. For more modern immigration
trends see 'A. M. 'Am mar, The People ofSharqiya (Cairo 1944).
226 PROCEEDINGS OF THE BRITISH ACADEMY
Town-sites and cemeteries in the Nile Delta were constructed
of mud-brick. They are now embedded in debris, which is
largely composed of mud-brick, and are partly submerged in
subsoil water. At first sight they seem to offer little to attract
the archaeologist.
The topography of this flat country offers even less visual
encouragement. In the course of time it has undergone im-
portant changes and its ancient waterways are now difficult
to recognize. The survey, excavation, and interpretation of
Delta sites are, therefore, not easy matters. Nevertheless,
the eastern Delta has attracted the increasing interest of archaeo-
logists in recent years.
II Tell el-Dab'a, its environment and previous investigations

The main focus of the investigations carried out by the
University of Vienna and the Austrian Archaeological Institute
since 1966 has been Tell el-Dab'a! in the Sharqiya province,
7 km north of Faqus, along the road to Tanis. Today a mound,
the diameter of which is approximately 500 m, represents
the remains of this once vast town-site. At the end of the last
century the site spread more than I km westwards/ as far as
the villages of Khata'na and Ezbet Helmy on the east bank of
the Bahr Faqus, which follows here the bed of the old Pelusiac
branch of the Nile.'
The tell developed on a turtleback, rising above the level
of the annual inundation. For two months during the summer
of 1882, Edouard Naville conducted an excavation there,
discovering a large temple enclosure-wall and within it the
remains of columns and a sphinx of Queen Sebeknefru (c. 1789-
1785 Be). In graves he found juglets of a ware later known as
Tell el-Yahudiya ware.s Some ISO m south-west of the tell, the
Egyptian archaeologist Labib Habachi discovered a number of
statues of the same queen and of a king of the r gth dynasty by
I Geographical coordinates: 31° 49' 20" cast of Greenwich and 30° 47' 15"
northern latitude.
2 E. Naville, The Shrine qf Saft el-Henneh and the Land of Goshen (London
1887), pp. 21-3, who conducted excavations at Tell el-Dab'a, described the
mound as continuous as far as Khata'ria.
3 A. Shafei, BSGE 21 (1946), p. 234; M. Bietak, Tell el-Dab'a II (Vienna
1975), p. 80, figs. 8,9, pI. IV. .

4 E. Naville, op. cit.; F. LI. Griffith, The Antiquities qf Tell el-Yahudiyeh,
EEF Mem. 7 (London 1890), pp. 56, 57, pI. XIX.

AVARIS AND PIRAMESSE 227
the name of Qemau Sehernedjherjotef.' These were probably in
the sanctuary of a small temple devoted to their cult. As we
shall see presently, the cults of other sovereigns of the Middle
Kingdom had been established earlier in this area.
swamps
N
A
lakes
~
• ancient mounds
turtlebacks TELL EL 1lA&~- Q.I/lTIR
FIG. 1. The Position of Tell el-Dab'a and Qantir in relation

to the reconstructed Pelusiac branch of the Nile.
North of the mound there is a natural lake basin, which at

the beginning of this century extended I km in an east-west
direction and 500 m north." Consequently, the older name of
Tell el-Dab'a was Tell el-Birka, 'the mound of the lake'.
Old survey maps, partly confirmed by a ground survey, show
a feeder-channel, still recognizable, coming from the direction
of the former Pelusiac branch of the Nile and issuing into the
lake; also, a drain-channel flowing from the lake towards
the large Bahr el-Baqar drainage system.
IL. Habachi, ASAE 52 (1954), pp. 458-70, pls. VI-IX.
2According to the 1 : 50000 map of the Survey of Egypt, Sh. IV-IV and
V NE (Cairo 1912).
This means that in ancient times it was possible to control the
level of the lake, which o-ffered, in connection with the Pelusiac
branch, ideal inland harbour facilities.
North of the lake, at Ezbet Rushdi, another Egyptian
archaeologist, Shehata Adam, I working for the Department of
Antiquities, uncovered a larger group of houses of the Middle
Kingdom and the Second Intermediate Period and a remark-
ably large temple, constructed by Ammenemes I and rebuilt by
Sesostris III. A stela from this excavation mentions the 'Temple
of Ammenemes in (at) the water of the town', providing literary
support for the reconstruction of the physical environment.>
The temple, in the sanctuary of which the lower part of a royal
statue was found, was probably devoted to the cult of the King
Ammenemes I (the 'Temple of Ammenemes'j.!
One kilometre to the east, at Ezbet Helmy, Edouard Naville
and later Zaki Sous, working for the Department of Antiquities,
excavated an imposing granite portal of a so-called DJdw, a
hall with unknown function," constructed under the same kings
as the temple (PI. IIa).
At the beginning of this century another group of tells still
existed, 800 m to the north, one being Tell Abu el-Felous,
situated on the inner bank of a large bend in the Nile. Here the
levee had grown very broad, offering favourable ground for
settlement above the level of the annual inundation.'
It is probable that the entire area between Tell el-Dab'a,
Khata'na, and Tell Abu el-Felous was settled in ancient times.
Recent ground surveys on agricultural areas between these sites
revealed a vast settlement from the time of the Middle Kingdom
onwards, covering an area of 1.5 if not 2 sq. km. Nearly a
hundred years ago F. LI. Griffith described the region as vir-
tually one huge tell.v
The settlement probably began as an outpost constructed
by Heracleopolitan kings of the First Intermediate Period in
order to check the Asiatic infiltration of that time.? The
I Shehata Adam, ASAE 56 (1959), pp. 207-26.
2 Op. cit., pp. 216 f., pI. IX.
3 H. Kees, MDIK 18 (1962), pp. 1 ff., suggestsaka-house of this king.
4 E. Naville, op. cit., p. 22, pI. 9/A 1-3; G. Maspero, ZAS 23 (1885),
pp. I 1- 13; L. Habachi, op. cit., pp. 448-58, pls. 2-4.
5 E. Naville, lococit.
6 In: W. M. F. Petrie, Tanis, part ii, Nebesheh (,Am) and Defenneh (Tah-
panhes), EEF, Mem. 4 (London 1888), p. 45.
7 A. Scharff, Der historische Abschnitt der Lehre des Merikare. Bayerische
Ak. d. Wiss., Sph. 136/8 (Munich 1936), pp. 39-45'

AVARIS AND PlRAMESSE
stela of the 'Temple of Ammenemes' also mentions a
'Temple of Kheti';' which may have been built by one of
the Heracleopolitan kings.> Sherds of that period have been
found by the survey of the Austrian expedition.
Another large settlement stands at Qantir, 2 km north of
Tell el-Dab'a, In 1929, working for the Department of Anti-
quities, Mahmud Hamza discovered the remains of a large
palace of Seti I, Ramesses II, and their successors! at the
southern edge of this village. It was impossible to recognize
its architectural plan in the muddy fields, but thousands of
faience tiles, inlaid with alabaster and coloured glass were
collected for the Cairo Museum. Many tiles also found their
way to the Metropolitan Museum+ where a window at which
the king appeared was reconstructed; also ornamental steps
leading, perhaps, to a throne. There is a beautiful doorway of
Seti I, cased with tiles," in the Louvre; and, in Munich, there
is a representative collection of tiles" from Qantir.
The Austrian expedition was able to locate the remains of
the substructure of this palace, preserved in the narrow em-
bankments of three small irrigation channels. Each embank-
ment consisted of a platform of mud-bricks with the lower
courses projecting as spurs into the sandy ground at regular
intervals of about 3 m. These courses created something like a
domed support for the platform upon which the structure proper
was erected of mud-brick. In this area in the early forties,
Labib Habachi found rooms with thick walls, floors paved with
stone, and a small basin, which was approached by stairs leading
from all sides to its centre. This may have been a bath and, if
so, it showed that the occupants did not neglect their basic
comforts."
While the walls of the palace were built of brick, cased
with tiles, the door-frames and columns were made of lime-
stone. From time to time, elegant octagonal columns have been
found in the fields and collected by members of our Institute
I Shehata Adam, loco cit. 2 H. Kees, op. cit., p. 9.
3 M. Hamza, ASAE 30 (1930), p. 20.

4 W. C. Hayes, Glazed Tiles from a Palace of Ramesses II at Kantir (New
York 1937).
5 C. H. Boreux, Musee du Louvre, Departement des Antiquites Egyptien-
nes, Guide-catalogue sommaire ii (Paris 1932), p. 4IO.
6 H. W. Muller, Die agyptische Sammlung des Bayerischen Staates, Ausstellung
(Munich 1966), No. 62; id., Werke altdgyptischer und koptischer Kunst, Die
Sammlung Wilhelm Esch, Duisburg (Munich 1961), pp. 20-4, pls, I-III.
7 L. Habachi, Tell el-Dab'a I and Qantir (forthcoming).
(PI. IlIa). vVehope to start excavations there soon in collabora-
tion with the Pelizaeus Museum of Hildesheim.
Apart from the royal palace, there is evidence of houses of
high Ramesside officials in the area. When the Didamun (or
Sama'na-) channel, passing to the west of Tell el-Dab'a and
Qantir, was enlarged more than twenty doorways (PI. lIb)
were unearthed and many stelae;' possibly fixed to the front
walls of houses. It seems that the enlargement cut into the
facades of a series of houses, which belonged to high officials
and royal princes. The living quarters were situated in the most
favourable position, along the eastern bank of the Pelusiac
branch of the river. We are able to reconstruct the setting,
since the Didamun channel was dug on the eastern levee of the
branch.
At Sama'ria, a sandy turtleback 3 km east of Tell el-Dab'a
and Qantir, a lintel of a house belonging to the famous Vizier
Paser was found," and a well of Ramesses II is still in situ
there. Besides high officials and princes, the above-mentioned
stelae report the accommodation of large numbers of military
personnel in Ramesside times.
North of Qantir, at Tell Abu el-Shafei, the base of a colossal
statue of Ramesses II with an estimated height of about 10 m!
was unearthed by Shehata Adam in 1955. Most probably it was
situated together with a second statue in front of a temple pylon.
To the east of the statue base Shehata Adam found the remains
of a large mud-brick foundation, possibly belonging to a pylon
or a temenos wall. In the course of illicit land-levelling in the
same neighbourhood over the last five years, remains of other
large statues and bases of columns have been discovered
(PI. IIIb, c). Unfortunately, the tell has now been destroyed.
Mahmud Hamza+ had already concluded from the evidence
of the royal palace that Qantir was the site of the famous
Delta residence of the 19th dynasty-Piramesse, identified by
the majority as the town Ramesse (Raamses) in the Old
Testament. This view was shared by W. C. Hayes! and given
added support by Labib Habachi, who further suggested that
I L. Habachi, ASAE 52 (1954), pp. 479-544; Habachi also showed

that the so-called Horbeit stelae probably came from Qantir.
2 Ibid., p. 480, pI. XX.
3 Shehata Adam, ASAE 55 (1958), pp. 306, 318-24, pIs. 27, 28.
4 Op. cit.
5 w. C. Hayes, op. cit., and The Scepter of Egypt II (Cambridge, Mass.

1959), p. 329. See also B. Couroyer, RB 53 (1946), pp. 75-98.
the capital of the Hyksos, Avaris, lay in this region, most
probably towards the south at Khata'na-Tell el-Dab'a. There
he made soundings and found structures dating from the Middle
Kingdom. Habachi's position was supported by J. van Seters
in a more exhaustive expose.'
The majority of scholars, however, continued to believe that
Piramesse should be identified with Tanis, 25 km further north,
where Pierre Montet's excavations had uncovered hundreds
of stone monuments, including stelae, obelisks, and statues of
the Ramesside period, all of which seemed to prove that it was
the capital of the 19th dynasty." A. Alt, H. Kees, and J. von
Beckerath suggested a compromise solution." Tanis was the
capital, while the royal residence was situated outside the city
at Qantir, a view opposed by Labib Habachi, J. van Seters, and
others, but approved by the majority at the time.
This compromise solution offered no explanation for the
location of Avaris, the capital of the Hyksos, which Habachi
and van Seters maintained lay at Tell el-Dab'a ; however, the
available evidence-namely the Tell el-Yahudiya juglets found
by Naville in I 882-was scanty. There was no positive evidence
that the tell contained this large Asiatic town. Egyptologists
in general and scholars of other disciplines believed that
Avaris was situated either at Tanis+ or somewhere on the eastern
fringe of the delta.! and this opinion was still held when the
Institute of Egyptology of the University of Vienna started its
excavations at Tell el-Dab'a in July 1966. The. excavations
continued until 1969, sometimes with two seasons a year.
Following an interruption caused by the Six-day War and its
aftermath, they were resumed in 1975 under the newly estab-
lished Austrian Archaeological Institute in Cairo," and are
still in progress.
I J. van Seters, The Hyksos, A New Investigation (New Haven and London
1966), pp. 127-51. For the idel1tification of Piram esse with Qantir see E. P.
Uphill, ]NES 27 (1968), pp. 291-316; ]NES 28 (1969), pp. 15-39.
2 Lit. ofP. Montet assembled by F. Le Corsu on RdE 19 (1967), pp. 15-17.
See also A. H. Gardiner, ]EA 19 (1933), pp. 122-8.

3 A. Alt, Die Deltaresidenz der Ramessiden (Berlin 1954), pp. 1-13; H. Kees,
Das alte ji'gypten, Eine kleine Landeskunde (Berlin 1955), p. 112; J. von Beckerath,
Untersuchungen zur politischen Geschichte der Zweiten Zwischen.;:,eitin ;fgypten
(Gluckstadt 1964), pp. 157-67.
4 R. North, Archaeo-Biblical Egypt (Rome 1967), pp. 76-123.
5 J. von Beckerath, op. cit., 157; R. Stadelmann, Avaris, LA' I, pp.
552-3.
6 See literature reference at the end.
Q.
I II Excavations at Tell el-Dab'a 1966-1978

Stratigraphy and chronology
The ten excavation campaigns so far have opened up rela-
tively small areas of the main tell-enough, however, to reveal
the vital evidence which was previously missing, namely the
presence of an extensive town-site belonging largely to an
Asiatic (Canaanite) 1 population with their own distinctive Syro-
Palestinian Middle Bronze Age Culture II A and B. The
occupation series begins with the Middle Kingdom and con-
tinues, with several strata, throughout the whole of the Second
Intermediate Period.
Following a break, which extended through most of the
r Sth dynasty, occupation seems to have started again during
the reign of King Horemhab (c.1332-1305 Be), at the latest,
and to have continued throughout the r qth and zoth dynasties
and, perhaps, part of the e rst dynasty. After a second break
settlement was resumed, to a limited extent, during the early
Ptolemaic Period.
The Middle Bronze Age Culture was of the same origin as
that in the neighbouring countries of Palestine and Syria, but in
Egypt it progressed along different lines due to the different
cultural environment and to its isolation. For this reason a
special relative chronological nomenclature, based on W. F.
Albright's terminology, will be used in this paper." The dates
given here for this Middle Bronze Culture in Egypt can at
present only be considered as tentative. Discussion on this
matter has been extensive and the results are not yet final.!
but there is general agreement that MB II B was more or less
contemporaneous with the Hyksos Period and that MB II A
should be placed earlier. Differences in dating can be explained
by referring to the different chronological schemes adopted by
I For ethnic terminology see K. M. Kenyon, Amorites and Canaanites. The
Schweich Lectures of the British Academy 1963 (London 1966).
2 W. F. Albright, 'Some Remarks on the Archaeological Chronology of
Palestine before about 1500 B.C.', in Chronologies in Old World Archaeology,
ed. by R. W. Ehrich (Chicago 1965), pp. 47-60; id., AASOR xiii (1933),
pp. 55-127; AASOR xvii (1938).
3 For the different chronological theories see W. A. Ward, Egypt and the
Eastern Mediterranean World 2200-1900 B.C. (Beirut 1971), pp. 11 ff., and
B. Williams, Archaeologyand Historical Problems of the Second Intermediate Period,
Thesis T 25834 (Chicago 1975); E. F. Campbell Jr., 'The Ancient Near East:
Chronological Bibliography and Charts', in The Bible and the Ancient Near
East (New York 1961), pp. 214 ff.; B. Mazar, IE] 18 (1968), p. 84.
different archaeologists. In accordance with more recent
chronological opinion, 1 the Hyksos rule in Egypt is considered
here as having begun in approximately 1650 BC (and not in
1720 BC). Before that date some time must be allowed for the
Asiatics, who later established the Hyksos rule, to settle in
Egypt. It was a time of weakness and of lack of frontier control
by the Egyptians of the 13th dynasty. As satisfactory evidence
for an absolute chronology has not yet emerged from the ex-
cavations at Tell el-Dab'a,> we have adopted for the beginning
of our sequence in stratum G what seems to be the most reason-
able scheme now available, namely that proposed by Albright
for dating the Byblos royal tombs." According to inscribed Egyp-
tian objects, tomb I dates from the time of Ammenemes III
(1842-1798 BC) and tomb II from Ammenemes IV (1798-
1789 BC). A synchronism is believed to exist between Prince
Yantin (tomb IV) and N eferhotep (± 1740- 1730 BC) and Zimri
Lim of Mari.t On the evidence of these dates the tombs belong
approximately to the eighteenth century BC. As they contain
MB II A pottery! and material older than Tell el-Dab'a,"
I J. von Beckerath, op. cit., pp. 218-24; W. HeIck, Die Beziehungen

.ifgyptenszu Vorderasienim3' und 2. Jahrtausend v. Chr., .,.fA 5 (Wiesbaden 1962),
pp. 97-102; E. Hornung, Untersuchungen zur Chronologie und Geschichte des
Neuen Reiches, A'A 1i (Wiesbaden 1964), pp. 50-2, 108, brings evidence in
favour of the low chronology in the time of the New Kingdom (accession of
Ahmose most likely in the year 1552/1 Be, overthrowing of the Hyksos
after the tenth regnal year). More recent proposals by M. L. Bierbrier and
R. KrauB would lower the chronology of the New Kingdom by a further
eleven years.
2 No reliable links with the absolute Egyptian chronology have been
obtained yet. There is a single radiocarbon reading for the late str. G between
1870 and 1720 Be. A series of further carbon samples is in process of being
obtained at the British Museum. For the problem of radiocarbon dates in
relation to the astronomical chronology see:]. Mellart, Antiquity lii, no. 207
(1979), pp. 15-18. In a tomb of str. E/3 a scarab of King Sebekhotep was
found and some deliberately destroyed bronze plates ofNeferhotep I (± 1741-
1730 Be) in a str. D/3 context. These objects could have been deposited
there long after their production. This must have been the case with the
bronze plates because they were found three strata above the scarab although
they were all produced at about the same time.
3 W. F. Albright, BASOR 99 (1945), pp. 9-18; BASOR 179 (1965),
pp. 38-43; and in Ehrich (ed.), op. cit. (Chicago 1965), pp. 54-7.
4 Id. BASOR 176 (1964), pp. 38-46; cf. also W. HeIck, op. cit.,
pp. 64-7,98.
5 P. Montet, Byblos et l' Egypte (Paris 1928, 1929), pls. CXVI-CXIX,
CXXIV; W. F. Albright, in Ehrich (ed.), op. cit. (Chicago 1965) ;0. Tufnell,
Berytus 18 (1969), pp. 5-33. 6 B. Williams, op. cit., p. 2045.
our series must start later or, at least, at the time the series
of royal tombs of Byblos was nearly completed; therefore,
± 1750-1720 Be would mark approximately the beginning of
stratum G. According to the latest evidence, MB II A had a
long period of development and 'should be accorded a maxi-
mum period of time' . 1
What appears to be a most interesting chronological scheme
for Tell el-Dab'a is one devised by Bruce Williams of Chicago,
who showed that graves in the Kerma Tumulus X contained
imported Tell el-Yahudiya material- of the same kind as that at
Tell el-Dab'a str. E/3 and 2, while in the earlier Tumulus III
(in the subsidiary grave K 334) a stone jar with the name of
Sebeknakht I or II was found>. Sebeknakht I is known to have
had the mayoralty of EI-Kab in year 1 of King Nebiryerawet I
(17th dynasty, ± 1625 Be). This evidence would make the
date for Tell el-Dab'a, str. E/3-2 (MB II B 1-2) rather later
than expected, implying that MB II B 1-2 shapes were still in
use after 1625 Be.
Since this alabaster jar of Sebeknakht from Tumulus III and

the Tell el-Yahudiya juglets from Tumulus X were found in
subsidiary graves, their chronological relationship is debatable,
but it would be difficult to reverse the relative chronology
and argue that the subsidiary graves of the later Tumulus X
might be much older than the subsidiary graves of the earlier
Tumulus III.
Another suggestion may be put forward. In Tumulus X a
statuette of Sebekhotep II (± 1750 Be) was found and was
attributed to the main burial.t As it is now considered likely
that the royal statues in Kerma were acquired by the seizure
of the MK strongholds in Lower Nubia, the terminus post quem
for the main grave could be lowered from ± 1750 to ± 1650 Be
while the date for the subsidiary graves would be placed soon
afterwards. Such a chronological reconstruction would lead us
I P. Beck, Tel Aviv 2 (1975), pp. 45-85 (83), shows three major phases of
MB II A at Tel Aphek; see also M. Kochavi, IE] 22 (1972), pp. 238-9; IE]
23 (1973), pp. 245-6.
2 G. A. Reisner, Excavations at Kenna IV-V (Cambridge, Mass. 1923),
fig. 264/23, 25, graves K 1042, 1084, type XII/I, 3.
3 Op. cit., p. 524, fig. 344, and B. Williams, op. cit., p. 2043, table 74,
p. 2045, table 75.
f G. A. Reisner, op. cit., p. 516, fig. 343, no. 33.
AV ARIS AND PIRAMESSE 235
to a date of ± 1650-1625 BC for material from str. E/3 (MB II
BI). This unexpectedly late date to Palestinian archaeologists
is supported by the Cypriot chronology with material corre-
sponding with str. E 3-2 in very late MC III contexts (± 1650-
1625 BC).1
There are also data from Palestine, which suggest lowering
the transition from MB II A to B from ± 1750 BC2 to the first
half of the seventeenth century BC. Olga Tufnell! recognized a
group of scarabs with a lotus decoration on the back as belong-
ing to the time of Neferhotep I and Sebekhotep IV (± 1740-
1720 BC), but this type is also attested until the beginning of the
H yksos Period (± 1650 BC). 4 Previously such scarabs had been
found in late MB II A graves at Tell Ajjul and in Jericho.s
A scarab with a lotus design as a seal-motif was found in a late
MB II A grave (str. G) at Tell el-Dab'a, As far as the present
evidence goes, we could roughly date late MB II A to the time
between 1750 and 1650 BC.
In the light of these discoveries it is clear that caution is
necessary. Moreover, we have also found a series of scarabs
with the rdl-Rr-motif which was formerly only attested in the
time of the 15th and 17th dynasties." A scarab of that kind
was found in tomb 303 B in Tell Ajjul in a late MB II A
transition to B grave." This evidence, presented by J. M.
Weinstein, would speak in favour of a date for the transition
from MB II A to B near the beginning of the Hyksos rule in
Egypt rather than in 1750 BC.8 However, graves from Tell el-
Yahudiya, corresponding with those in Tell el-Dab'a str. Ell
and D/3 (MB II B 3) have been dated by Olga Tufnell to
roughly prior to 'Awoserre' Apophis and contemporaneous
I R. Merrillees, Trade and Transcendence in the Bronze Age Levant, SIMA
xxxix (Goteborg 1974), p. 48, fig. 31/14-16; p. 55, figs. 38,39; p. 56, fig, 40.
The three quoted juglets are parallels of types from strata F, E/3, and E/2
at Tell el-Dab'a, See also E. Vermeule, Toumba tou Skourou, The Harvard
Univ. Cyprus Archaeological Expedition and the Museum of Fine Arts,
Boston 1971-4, fig. 17 A-B, tomb V (corresponding to str. E/2-1 in Tell
el-Dab'a).
Z Y. Yadin, Hazer. The Schweich Lectures of the British Academy 1970 (London
1972), p. 108. 3 O. Tufnell, Levant 2 (1970), pp. 95-9.
4 J. Garstang, El Arabah (London 1901), p. 10, with the Hyksos name

Sheshi. 5 J. M. Weinstein, BASOR 217 (1975), p. ro.
6 D. O'Connor, World Archaeology 6 (1974), fig. 13: Q.; J. M. Weinstein,
loco cit., mentions this type also of occurring rarely during the 13th dyn.,
quoting D. O'Connor, who presents this type, however, as purely Hyksos.
7 O. Tufnell, Bull. of the Univ. of London, Inst. of Archaeology, iii (1962), pl.
4/115. 8 J. M. Weinstein. loco cit.

with Khayan (± 1614-1594 BC),I which would accord well as
a chronological continuation of str. E/3-2.
Nevertheless, caution is still advisable in estimating absolute
dates for the MB-chronology. We have tried to place our fine-
strata sequence in such a way as to reconcile the conflicting
data and their interpretation with the various historical
possibilities. Within this paper two possibilities of dating and
historical interpretation- are considered, which, being about
30 years apart in their inception, represent also the maximum
chronological gap within which we can operate. Favour is
given to the lower chronological interpretation because of the
chronological data presented. Here each stratum of the Second
Intermediate Period starting with F (MB II A/B) at 1680 BC
is allotted ± 20 years of duration while the higher chronological
scheme would start at ± 17 I 5 BC with F which would be more
acceptable to Palestinian archaeologists, though still ± 35
years lower than the supposed transition date of ± 1750 BC
for MB II A/B. This second scheme poses, however, certain
difficulties with the str. E/3-2 Kerma links! and the Cypriot
chronology+ already mentioned. Still, the chronological pattern
of the second scheme is within the range of possibility and may
gain support in future.
The stratigraphy of Tell el-Dab'a can be presented for the
time being as follows i"
Str. A: Early Ptolemaic settlement, 3rd century Be, limited area.
hiatus
Str, B: Settlement, large temple, stores, fortifications (?) from
the end of the rSth dynasty to the eoth dynasty (± 13I 0-
1080 Be) and scanty evidence of the 21St dynasty.
hiatus
's». ot». Massive filling-wall across the tell, early 18th dynasty (?)
(± 1540 Be).
Str. D/2: Dense occupation, late Hyksos Period, Middle Bronze Age
Culture (MB) II C (± 1570 to 1540 Be).
I O. Tufnell, in Archaeology in the Levant, Essaysfor K. Kenyon (Warminster
1978), pp. 76-101. For dates see J. von Beckerath, op. cit., p. 223.
Z See below, p. 254-6.
3 If this theory is correct, the royal statues in Kerma must have been
placed in the tumuli at about the time they were produced and not after the
breakdown of the Egyptian occupation in Lower Nubia (± 1650 Be). The
Sebeknakht vesselin Tumulus III would even increase the problem.
4 See p. 235 n. I.
5 Corrections and additions may come during future field-work.
AVARIS AND PlRAMESSE 237
Str. D/3: Increased density in occupation, only minor cemeteries,
tombs in or beneath houses, MB II B 3 (± 1600/1590 to
1570 Be).
Str. E/I: Houses began to be built in the cemeteries surrounding the
large sacred area, MB II B 3 (± 1630/1610-1600/1590 Be).
Str. E/2: Cemeteries with mortuary temples surrounding a large
sacred area in the midst of a huge settlement, covering
2 sq. km, spacious distribution oflots, MB II B 2 (± 1660/
1630-1630/1610 Be).
Str. E/3: Very scattered occupation, large sacred area surrounded
by houses within large plots, sand-bricks, end of the 13th
dynasty, beginning of Hyksos Period, MB II B I (±1690/
1660-1660/1630 Be).
Str. F: New occupation of the tell, new distribution ofland-plots,
very scattered buildings of mud-brick, small cemeteries
with relatively numerous tombs, MB II A 3 and B I, late
Middle Kingdom or beginning of H yksos Period (± I 7 I 5/
1680-1690/1660 Be).
Str. G/I-4: Densely developed settlement of sand-brick, family graves
within land-plots close to houses, MB II A 3 and Egyptian
culture of Middle Kingdom, 13th dynasty (± I 750/1720-
1715/1680 Be).
Str. H: Open settlement, many enclosure walls, developed to
Str. G but separated partly by large ash-layers, MB II A 3
and Egyptian culture of MK, early 13th dynasty (before
±1750/1720 Be).
In displaced positions, artefacts of the early first dynasty
were found. Graves or even large living quarters of this period
may be expected to come to light one day under subsoil water
during excavations.
The following summary shows the development of the site
in chronological order from stratum to stratum.
Stratum H
On the sandy turtleback (gezira), enclosure walls of sand-
brick are recognizable in all the areas excavated at Tell el-
Dab'a. Their outline is somewhat irregular. Living quarters
consisted of huts, built of sand-bricks. We gain the impression
of a rural settlement in the process of development. Perhaps
Tell el-Dab'a preserves only the fringe of the Middle Kingdom
settlement, the centre of which was situated more at the north-
western shore of the lake, mentioned above, in the area ex-
tending from Ezbet Rushdi (temple of Sesostris III) to the
-------- - ----- -

Djadu-hall at Ezbet Helmy." No strata corresponding with H
and G were found at Khata 'na further south.
Stratum G
After perhaps a short interval, marked in some areas by a
conflagration layer of charcoal, which Shehata Adam also
noticed north of the lake at Ezbet Rushdi el-saghira, settlement
was continued by the same people within approximately the
same plot-outlines, but in a much more compact and solid
fashion. Houses were normally rectangular constructions of
sand-brick with two rooms. The layout resembles the hiero-
glyphic sign ILl and seems to be of Egyptian origin. The en-
trance led to a large room with a fireplace in the middle or near
the door. Another door, located in the partition-wall at the back
of the room, gave access to a second room (PIs. IV, V). Such
a building normally had later additions and was surrounded,
at least partly, by a sand-brick fence, often round in shape,
enclosing a court (PI. IV). In front of the houses we usually
found round silos, also constructed of brick.
Besides this so-called 'snail-house type' we found other kinds
of buildings, some, as in stratum H, being simple rectangular
huts, while others were more solid, and larger structures with
several rooms. Each building was attached to another large
building with thick walls and a paved floor on which still
stood the plinths of columns. We also found small structures
with a wide opening towards the narrow streets. These must
have been shops. Such shops had many Syro-Palestinian
amphoras, besides other kinds of pottery, suggesting that they
were something like wine stores.
The ceramic corpus of this period consisted of several wares.
Among the finds which must be mentioned is an interesting
type of hand-made large oval bowl of marly clay with aquatic
flowers carved on the sides and an imitation of a net incised
on the bottom. Sometimes a fish design is found on the net.
This type was obviously a fish-offering bowl.
One superb piece was a large jug with a black-polished
surface and a white incised design with geometrical and figured
motifs, such as jumping fish, providing, to some extent, a link
to the so-called Lisht juglet (Fig. 3, PI. VII). 2 Here we have,
without doubt, a ceremonial jug; it was found within one of the
larger houses attached to a building with columns, which may
I See p. 228 nn. 1 and 4.
2 M. Bietak, MDIK 26 (1970), pI. XIX/c.
have been a temple. This is obviously a forerunner of the later
Tell el-Yahudiya ware.
In addition to such elaborate pieces and the amphoras,
which may all have been imports, we found MB house-ware,
such as large globular pots of a rough sand-clay,' and rough
hand-made cooking pots of straw-tempered clay (ware Ic or Vc)
11 12 13 17 18 19
\(
TE L EL D B· A
s iAl"U" _/2'
HI 1,250
FIG. 2. Tell el-Dab'a, stratum G, late Middle Kingdom settlement
with finger imprints under the lip. They have indeed a pre-
historic look and occur more frequently in stratuJI H than in G.2
While the layout of the houses looks rather Egyptian, the
burial customs and equipment, apart from the pottery, reveal
the kind of people who lived there in the time of the Late
Middle Kingdom. The graves were dug within the house-
complex, and were generally situated beside the houses. This is
I Cf. P. Beck, op. cit., fig. 2/7, fig. 4/18-lg, fig. 6/15-16, fig. 16/2-5, but
fabricated obviously of a different clay there.
2 Ibid., fig. 1/2, fig. 2/15-16, fig. 5/1-2, fig. 6/18, fig. 8/lg. Those cooking
pots do not seem to have been used in the post-palace phase at Tel Aphek,
which is obviously parallel to our late str. G and F.
J.E. COBB LIBRARY

CENTRAL BAPTIST COU.E(;r
indeed strange for Egypt, but we have very little knowledge of
the Delta's cultural development.
In some of the complexes the burials were Egyptian in
character: mere pits in which the body lay supine on its back-
although in one instance the body had been placed in a plain
limestone coffin (PI. VI). The only objects associated with
such burials were very simple things like beads or a kohl-pot.
FIG 3. Large Tell el-Yahudiyajug from str. G with incised decoration
In other complexes, however, the graves were more richly

furnished and the burials presented a distinctly Syro-Palestinian
appearance. Especially notable were three tombs in pits in
front of the doors of a house (PI. IV).
Two of these tombs had vaulted chambers constructed of
brick and were designed for family burials. One undisturbed
chamber contained an adult male in a semi-contracted position
with an ornamented broad belt made of copper! and a broad
triangular dagger (Fig. 4). Beneath him was another burial,
that of an infant between 6 and 12 years of age. Near the en-
trance of the chamber was a pile of offerings consisting of a
large pottery plate (ware I c) with two drinking cups, a ring-
stand of copper, a grey polished jug of Syro-Palestinian type,
(MB II A 3) and a sheep cut up into several pieces, such as the
back, the ribs, the mandible, and the legs. This kind of grave is
typical of the later occupation of the tell, and, in its context,
ICf. K. M. Kenyon, Excavations at Jericho I (Jerusalem 1960), fig. 117,
Tomb J/3 (transition of MB II A/B).
it shows that Egyptian or Egyptianized and Canaanite popula-

tions lived side by side during the 13th dynasty, just as happens
today in the eastern Delta, where the Egyptian fellaheen and
the Arabs (i.e. settled Bedouin) live together.
The location of the graves within the community reveals a
sympathetic background, showing strong family ties. The dead
members of the family were thought to participate in the daily
FIG. 4. Bronze belt with dagger from tomb m/15 no. 9, str. G
life of the living. Daily meals were consumed either behind the
threshold (at the fireplace) or even in front of the door, in
close proximity to the occupants of the tombs. Perhaps the
deceased participated ideally in the meals through libations.
The fish offering bowls, found near the graves, may have been
used in this connection.
Stratum F
A complete change is visible in this stratum. While dwellings
were built close together in str. G, few and widely separated
houses can be observed in the following stratum F. It seems
that to some extent the ruins of stratum G and small new
buildings of mud-brick were used as living quarters. A new
distribution of plots was beginning to develop. Inevitably this
was influenced by what had survived of stratum G, but it was
markedly different, and the outlines of those new plots were
maintained, with only minor adjustments, throughout the
whole series of strata covering the Second Intermediate Period.
It looks as if small family or clan cemeteries began to cluster
around a centre, which was very probably already composed of
the large Canaanite temples to be discussed below in connection
with stratum E/3. As F tombs have not been found anywhere
under the temple strata, it would seem that the temples date
back to that period. At a greater distance from this centre
we also found tombs in the direct vicinity of domestic build-
ings, which may date from this period.
The tombs were now purely Canaanite (MB II A 3/B I)
and showed little Egyptian influence. Only one burial was
found in a limestone coffin, but it was in a contracted position
(PI. Xa). It was equipped with a narrow parallel-sided battle-
a~e with square section and a triangular ribbed dagger (MB
II A). The owner had a scarab with the title of an idmo mr
s!lJwt rsmio, i.e. the deputy treasurer (with the name) rAm = the
Asiatic. 1
No truly Egyptian type of burial was found in stratum F. The
tombs were normally richly furnished. Especially notable was
a chamber-grave with two females (PIs. XI, XII). One of the
two had a simple golden diadem, and an elaborate double
necklace with golden pendants, carnelian, and faience beads
of a type and quality known only from princesses' graves of the
Middle Kingdom, such as those in Dahshur, Lisht, and el-
Lahun- (PI. XIII). The key piece proved to be a golden
lion amulet. A kohl-pot for black eyepaint was made of haema-
tite with a black metallic look (PI. XII). There were also ala-
baster vases. The pottery, which was largely of Syro-Palestinian
design, was of superb quality. Offerings were generally con-
tained in black-grey-polished, brown-polished, or red-polished
pottery, the last with a metallic gloss. A few incised juglets
were found, showing that they were already in use. Some of the
pots were distinctly of foreign manufacture while the majority
were produced locally.
Objects from a similar, even richer, tomb are now in the
Metropolitan Museum in New York, with the supposed pro-
venience of Salhiya, 10 km south-east of Tell el-Dab'a ; they
were obviously once the property of a royal person.! They
I M. Bietak, MDIK 23 (1968), p. 93, pI. XXXII/c.
Z J.de Morgan, Fouilles Ii Dahchour (Vienna 1895), pI. XXIII/IO, pI.
XVI/7; H. E. Winlock, The TreasureojLahun (New York 1934), pI. XII/A, pI.
XIII/A/I, 2; id., The Tomb of Senebtisi at Lisht (New York 1916), pls. XXII,
XXIII. For 18th dynasty jewellery, similar to the Tell el-Dab'a jewellery,
see H. E. Winlock, The Treasure oj Three Egyptian Princesses (N ew York
1948), pI. XII/A, B (shell pendants of gold), pI. XX (seed-shaped beads).
3 H. G. Fischer, EMMA 28 (Oct. 1969), pp. 69-70. It is, however,
possible that this treasure came from Tell el-Ahmar, 10 km east of Tell
el-Dab'a, Cf. also H. E. Winlock, op. cit., 1948, pI. VII (diadem of two stripes
with gazelle protomes).
A/II-M/10 GRAB 8
ANSICHT C-D
/
FIG. 5. Tomb m/JO no. 8, str. F or E/3
include a diadem consisting of an electrum band to which

are affixed five hollow animal heads (gazelles and a stag). This
so-called Salhiya Treasure may very well come from Tell
el-Dab'a, where, according to evidence published by W. K.
Simpson,' members of the royal family of the Hyksos dynasty
had left their monuments.
One question which must be asked is whether the rich Egyptian
jewellery (besides the Asiatic jewellery) could have been ob-
tained from plundering a royal Middle Kingdom necropolis or
palaces near Memphis. The tomb of Tell el-Dab'a certainly
did not belong to a princess, but to a rich woman. Part of her
I W. K. Simpson, CdE 34 (1959), pp. 233-9.
outfit was indeed surprising and it may well have been made in
the first instance for someone else.
Stratum F marks a new beginning in the settlement of
purely Asiatic (Canaanite) people, who had strong cultural ties
with the previous settlers of stratum G. The inhabitants of the
site were now fewer, but richer, than in the time of stratum G.
• DI.B:;;:~e:t~;~:.
:::'~!M~'~
~.
~
..
~t
...•...... ~
FIG. 6A. Offerings from tomb m/lo no. 8, str. F or E/3
The housing installations on the other hand looked rather

rudimentary, so that the conclusion may be drawn that the
inhabitants were complete newcomers. The inhabitants of
stratum G seem to have left the site before the arrival of another
wave of Asiatic immigrants, who settled and remained there
until the beginning of the New Kingdom. Most probably they
were responsible for the establishment of the Hyksos rule in
Egypt. Male burials with weapons show a warrior strain in the
newcomers (PI. X). Especially at the beginning, they possess very
original features; some of them, indeed, look rather barbarous.
Stratum F also yielded at least two tombs of servants, who
seem to have been intended to accompany their masters to the
next world. Very remarkable was the burial of a servant,
perhaps 20-25 years of age, whose body lay across the entrance
of the tomb-chamber (PI. XIV). Anthropologists have not yet
been able to determine the sex.! No accompanying offerings
were found. The (ace was turned in the direction of the chamber
as if the servant were waiting for instructions. The head and
'~'(J'~.
,,.
.....
/f
:/
/,
)\ ",::~':
27
"
'
.:,
QRA •• to·.
\.:
••
.' ~.,/:, I rf)) I~':" .~;. I

, ~I I:~'".." .r.:
'() I ~~!:.'"
•• ••
s, ••
02 33 a.
FIG. 6B. Offerings from tomb mllo no. 8, str. F or E/3
upper body were covered by bricks. The pit of the grave fitted
the body so closely it seems very unlikely that this was a secon-
dary burial, because, were that the case, the original outline of
the pit would have shown signs of damage."
Another distinctive custom of the Canaanites who settled at
the edge of the eastern Delta was the burial of donkeys, nor-
mally in pairs, in front of the tomb-door. They seem to repre-
sent teams, perhaps used for pulling a carriage for the funeral.
I Investigations are being carried out by E. Strouhal.
2 Servant burials as in Tell el-Dab'a, str. F, are not yet known from
Palestine, as far as I know, but similar graves occur within a settlement in the
Diyala region. Cf. P. Delougaz, H. D. Hill, and S. Lloyd, Private Houses and
One team of donkeys was even provided with an offering,
namely a drinking cup. They were buried contrary to rule,
separate from any tomb within a round pit (PI. XVa). The
tomb which yielded a scarab of a deputy of the treasury, men-
tioned above, had five donkey burials! deposited in front of the
a '0 '0
H lOjiil
All!. mIlS GRAB 8 STRATUM F
Fro. 7. Offerings from tomb mIlS no. 8, str. F
chamber's entrance and, above the animals, two human

burials were found; unfortunately they were not in their ori-
ginal position. Donkey burials have been found at other MB
sites in Egypt (Inshas, Tell el-Farasha, Tell el-Maskhutaj- and
also at Tell el-Ajjul, in Palestine near Gaza, and at Jericho.3
Graves in the Diyala region, DIP 88 (Chicago 1967), pI. 9, houses 5, gr. 96/98,
gr. 101/105; pl. 10, gr. 112/114.
I M. Bietak, MDIK 23 (1968), pp. 90-3; J. Boessneck, Tell el-Dab'a III
(Vienna 1976), pp. 21-5, pI. 7-9.
2 BSFE 1 (June 1949), p. 12. Some MB II A/B tombs with donkey burials
were found 1978 by the Univ. of Toronto under J. Holladay Jr. in Tell
Maskhuta (personal communication).
3 W. M. F. Petrie, Ancient Gaza r (London 1931), p. 4, pls, VIII, IX;
A. Grosvenor Ellis, in K. M. Kenyon, op. cit., 535-6.
It should also be mentioned that we found evidence that
horses were kept at Tell el-Dab'a from the Early Hyksos Period.
Two isolated equine molars, both from str. E/2, were identified
by Professor Boessneck.!
Stratum ES
This stratum shows a consolidation of the newcomers of
stratum F. Now the building of walls offered a distinct de-
marcation of plot boundaries. The most conspicuous feature
was a large sacred area (Fig. 8) around two major temples,
one of which was constructed, or at least projected, during the
time of stratum F. The whole complex is indeed one of the
largest Canaanite temple areas, if not the largest. At present
it is not evident whether what has been excavated represents
half or less than half of the sacred precinct; but it has already
become clear from the size and layout of this complex that the
Canaanite community in the Eastern Delta can be identified
not only by its material culture and burial customs, but by
its distinctive architecture and, especially, its religious archi-
tecture.
The main feature of the complex was a temple (33.75 x 2 I .50
m)2 constructed of sandy mud-brick (Fig. 9, PIs. XVb, XVI).
The orientation of the building followed the general layout of
the whole area since the Middle Kingdom (NNW-SSE) and
it is in line with the ritual orientation of Canaanite temples.>
The main hall and the sanctuary-recess were surrounded by
double walls, which formed, with the filling between them,
very massive walls, 4 m in thickness, while behind the sanc-
tuary the thickness exceeded 5 m. Unfortunately the entire
building is in a very poor state of preservation, because deep
sebakh-pits4 have been sunk down to the subsoil water-level, and
the mound is very much eroded at this point. Obviously, the
sebbakhin knew very well where it would be rewarding to dig for
antiquities. Therefore, parts of the layout have to be recon-
structed, but the most important features are still preserved.
The sanctuary-recess, perhaps 8 m wide, protruded a little
into the broad cella (PI. XVa). Perhaps this recess was fronted
I J. Boessneck, op. cit., p. 25.
2 This is the biggest temple of the MB-culture; compare the list of temples
assembled by W. G. Dever, BASOR 216 (1974), p. 45, tab. II.
3 Y. Yadin, op. cit., 104.
4 I.e. pits, excavated in order to gain material for brick production or as

fertilizer. Such digging also leads to the discovery of antiquities for sale.
R
with a door like a shrine. I A narrow corridor-like pro-cella,
only 4 m deep, separated the cella from the entrance-hall.
Probably there were two doors situated along the main axis
of the pro-cella. Besides separating the sanctuary from the
entrance-hall, the function of the pro-cella was to provide a
connection, through a side-door in the east wall, with another
,. • 1(1 ill
FIG. 8. Tell el-Dab'a, sacred precinct, str. E/3-2
building, which is now being excavated. Most probably it was

another separate temple (no. V). Possibly a threshold of lime-
stone, found in a nearby pit, belonged originally to this door.
In front of the corridor, in the first building, was an entrance-
hall extending along the whole width of the temple. It too
was 4 m deep, and was clearly an addition, so that the original
length of the temple amounted to only '29 m. At that stage the
temple was finished with a whitewashed mud-coating, and
outside we found many fragments of azure-blue paint, so
possibly the temple was painted either outside or inside in blue.
Later, the entrance-hall was enlarged, and a new front wall
I See room 8192 of the big double temple at Hazor: Y. Yadin, op. cit.,
p. 97, fig. 23·
built 3 m towards the north with three narrow doors, one near
each corner and one east of the main axis. This is strange in-
deed, but can perhaps be explained by the presence of some
cult object in the middle of the front of the temple. Perhaps it
was a painting or a column or a statue, which was afterwards
removed. Another entrance was found in the west wall, near
the north-western corner of the building, giving direct access
from the street. Later this entrance was closed by a curved wall,
linking the entrance with a small rectangular building at the
north- western corner of the temple, perhaps a guardian's house. I
The four doors suggest that the entrance-hall was to be
accessible to many people; so part of the temple, at least, was
open to the public while the remainder was reserved, most
probably, for priests only. The entrances, at least three of them,
were hidden from the entrance-hall by screen-walls which,
together with what has survived of the sand-brick pavement,"
suggest that the room was covered with a roof. The original
breadth of 4 m, like that of the pro-cella, would allow a roofing
of wooden beams, while, for roofing the enlarged hall, columns
were necessary. Also, the roof of the broad cella (13 x 8 m)
needed similar support, but the floors of both rooms, where the
bases of columns must have been situated, have been destroyed
by sebbakhin.
A limestone base of a column was, in fact, found, but not in
its original position. It was turned upside down and set in
front of the temple in order to mark a special place. Two sides
of the base were parallel to the front of the temple: Places of
such a kind, distinguished by a column base or by stone pebbles,
are also known from Megiddo and Hazor. 3
No exact parallel to the Tell el-Dab'a temple is yet known,
but the general features are typical of Canaanite temples: in
particular the recess-like sanctuary, a cella in front of it, and
a pro-cella which may be a broad or a narrow corridor-
like feature. We also may find in front of the pro-cella an
entrance-hall+ The casemate-like mud-brick filling wall may
I Buildings attached at the front corner of the temple can also be observed
at other sites, e.g. Hazor, area H, str. 2, and Alalakh, cf. Sir Leonard
Woolley, Alalakh (Oxford 1955), fig. 35.
2 Only behind the entrances did we find pavements of mud-brick, which
were more water-resistant than the sandy material.
3 G. Loud, Megiddo II, Seasons of 1935-39, OIP 62 (Chicago 1948), figs. 255,
259; Y. Yadin, op. cit., 81; id. et aI., Hazer III and IV, pI. CXII/3.
4 The basic elements, such as a rectangular niche, a broad cella, and a
double pro-cella were found at Alalakh, str. VII (L. Woolley, op. cit., fig. 30);
be considered a substitute for the broad massive stone walls
in Palestine, but parallels for such a filling have also been found,
e.g. in the double temple of Hazer,' together with something
like an entrance-hall constructed only of simple walls.
Even the size of the Tell el-Dab'a temple is remarkable, and
is matched only by the Hazor double temple.
ATCH.\NA.lEMPlE SlII. VlI
1lAZOR. AREA "

TEMPlE STR.II
T£U. EL D.IlI'A sm. E/3
TEMPlE 111
ATCH.INA. TEMPlE SlR.1Y r-foor=Io! -!'!==."""' ----il.

FIG. g. Tell el-Dab'a, temple III, original plan and later changes, comparison with
other Canaanite temples
In front of the temple is a large area, bounded on the west

by the above-mentioned guardian's room and a long narrow
temple, a mortuary temple, as we shall see shortly. Between
them and upon a huge threshold of limestone stood an
entrance to the sacred area from the street. It was the doorway
to the area.
In line with the axis of the main temple, at a distance of
about fifteen metres, remains of two layers of a rectangular
altar, a bamah (c. 3 x 2 m), constructed of mud-brick, were
found. It was covered, or rather filled, with ashes and charred
bones. In its direct vicinity were deep pits, filled with more
with a single pro-cella compare Hazor, area H, str. 2 and 3; Y. Yadin,
op. cit., p. 76, fig. 19.
I Y. Yadin, op. cit., fig. 23.
charred bones, mainly of cattle and a few of sheep, but not a

single pig bone was found, I although there is much evidence of
the pig in the food-offerings of the tombs. It looks as if, for
offerings to the gods, pigs were already considered as taboo.
Apart from bones, the pits were filled with large amounts of
pottery, of the kind used for offerings in front of the temple.
The pottery consisted mainly of drinking cups and drinking
vases, bowls and plates made of Nile clay (ware la, b), but
there were also Syro-Palestinian dipper-juglets (ware IV) and
other ceremonial pottery (PI. XIX).
Towards the east, the offering court was bounded by a house,
consisting of two rooms, similar to the buildings of stratum G,
but with an antechamber, which was accessible from the court.
It is not improbable that this was the priest's house. Inside the
building a large four-handled crater was found, sunk into a
shallow pit (PI. XVIIlb). South of the building, separated from
it only by a narrow passage, was another building with a stone-
paved floor and a niche in the eastern wall. It looks as if this
too was a small temple with a pair of niches towards the east
and an open entrance from the court."
The offering-court was separated from the area of the above-
mentioned mortuary temple at the eastern edge of the sacred
area by an enclosure wall, which may have been, to judge
from its thickness, taller than a man. This temple was long and
narrow (25.5 x5-7 m) and it had a tower of thick brickwork
(4.5 x5 m) on the northern side (PI. XVIIb).
The mortuary temple consisted of a long narrow hall (12.80 x
4.30 m). Its walls were overlaid with a coating of mud-plaster
painted blue and decorated with figures. Unfortunately, only
small fragments of the coating have survived, so that the details
of its paintings can no longer be recognized.
Two entrances lead into this hall, one from the area in the
north-eastern corner of the sacred precinct, the main feature of
which is the tower. This part of the sacred precinct is a cemetery
with several well-furnished tombs with mud-brick chambers
(PI. XX), one containing a donkey-team burial in front of
the entrance. The second entrance opens into a triangular
court, separated from the offering court of the main temple
(III) by the above-mentioned enclosure wall. The triangular
court, therefore, clearly belongs to the mortuary temple. Also,
I According to a still unpublished examination by J. Boessneck and A. von
den Driesch, 1977.
2 Cf. A. Moortgat, Tell ChueraIV (Wiesbaden 196 I), pI. VI.
within this area, which was already a small cemetery during
the time of the preceding stratum F, graves were found, and
it may well be that the temple included in its functions the
service of the older stratum F tombs. The development of
cemeteries around the whole area clearly began in the time of
stratum F.
It looks as if access to the triangular enclosure was only
possible by entering the temple through the northern door,
from the near-by cemetery in the north-west, and egress by the
southern door of the temple.
To the left of the entrance of the mortuary temple, two
other rooms were added, the first of which had a rectangular
construction with a brick wall-perhaps a pedestal for a statue-
attached to its back wall. Below this, a copper harpoon-
perhaps a votive gift-had been placed. Within the wall a
whole red-polished pot (ware IV) was found. Behind this room
was another one with a pot sunk to its neck under the floor.
The layout and size of this building resemble a reflected
image, like the early dynastic Abu Temple at Tell Asmar.!
Even the second court, accessible only through the temple,
has a parallel there.
It is because of the relationship to the two cemeteries, the
outer and the inner, that we identify this building as a mortuary
temple. It seems to me that this long narrow building could be
compared with the so-called palace of Tell el-Ajjul, especially
palace III, consisting of a long narrow building with a similar
arrangement of rooms and even with a tower in front of it.
This may have been a part of a major sacred complex.> The
cemetery in the court, however, the so-called courtyard
cemetery, is earlier.
Still to be mentioned are the remains of another building,
most probably also a temple, with the same length as the large
temple, with filled-in walls between (PI. XVIIa); it seems to
have three sanctuaries, a feature taken over perhaps from
Egyptian temples (see below, str. E/2). Unfortunately the
interior of this construction has been largely destroyed. No
I H. Frankfort, Iraq Excavations 1932-33, Oriental Institute Communica-

tions 17, fig. 36.
2 W. M. F. Petrie, Ancient Gaza II and III (London 1932-33); W. F.
Albright, AS]L 55 (1938), pp. 337-59; O. Tufnell, op. cit., pp. 1-37; J. R.
Stewart, ed. by H. E. Kassis, Tell el Ajjul, The Middle Bronze Age Remains,
SIMA 38 (Goteborg 1974). Another 'courtyard temple' with separate tower
is known from Shechem, cf G. E. Wright, Shechem (London 1965), fig. 70.
stratum was added to this temple during the Second Inter-
mediate Period and, obviously, not on top of the other major
temple. Therefore, it would seem that the two shrines were
kept intact throughout the entire Hyksos Period, or, at least, that
the place remained sacred during that time while the tell rose
around it; consequently there was a depression in the area of
the two temples. It was not before the Ramesside Period that
new constructions were started on top of the temple ruins.
The function of the two temples is not yet clear. The sur-
viving traces of objects connected with the cult in front of the
major temple with the altar (bamah) and the remains of sacri-
fices in the pits are typical of Canaanite rituals. Unfortunately,
so far no votive offerings have been found because large areas
within the temples have been destroyed by sebbakhin. The
two temples were placed in direct relationship to each other
as is recognizable from the above-mentioned side-door of the
main shrine. Possibly, they served to house a divine couple
such as Batal and Astarte! because in temples of such a size
we have to expect major deities of the Canaanite pantheon.
What was new and unexpected, however, was the encroach-
ment of cemeteries and mortuary temples on the main sacred
area, although not a single grave was found in direct proximity
with the chief temple III. Therefore we do not believe that the
main temple served purposes connected with the mortuary
cult. There may have been an increasing desire for the dead to
participate in the cult celebrations and feasts, or, to put it
simply, to be near the god after death.
To the north, the sacred area and its cemeteries were
bounded by a sandy brick wall. While three sides of the sacred
compound were surrounded by narrow streets, we found a very
broad street (I I m), north of the area, which may have been a
place where worshippers assembled before entering the area.
Around the sacred area large, nearly empty compounds
developed. At present it is not clear whether the two areas
west of the sacred complex were spacious plots around small
houses, which had been constructed there with a few graves in
the compound, far from the house, rather like those in stratum
G, or, if they were already intended as family cemeteries,
clustered around the holy area. The house in the north-western
I The cults of Seth in Ba'al-like shape are to be expected of Avaris and are
well attested at Piramesse; cf. R. Stadelmann, Syrisch-paldstinensiche Gottheiten

in ifgypten (Leiden 1967), pp. 32-47; J. von Beckerath, op. cit., p. 160. But
Astarte too had a temple in Piramesse (Pap. Anastasi iv, 6. 4-5)'
compound could perhaps be considered as a kind of mor-
tuary temple, but the two circular silos argue against thisi nter-
pretation. The idea of creating such a cemetery, which developed
during the following stratum E/2, may already have been in
mind because real settlements started in the second row of
compounds towards the west, and, also, directly north of the
sacred area. I
The tombs are principally of the same construction as those in
stratum F and, partly, in stratum G. They consist of sand- or
mud-brick chambers with a barrel vault, constructed of nearly
vertical courses, leaning against the back wall. The chambers
were built in pits, which were later filled up. Within the
chambers, the bodies were normally laid in a semi-contracted
position with the heads near the entrance (PI. XXIII). Usually,
beneath the head, heaps of red- and black-polished juglets
were deposited. Near the entrance there were sheep-offerings,
cut up and partly placed on big plates. As a rule, we find one
to three burials in the chambers. Children were normally
buried within the domestic areas in two-handled amphoras of
Syro-Palestinian origin. Among the pottery, especially notable
is the frequent appearance of the so-called Tell el-Yahudiya
ware, i.e. black- or grey-polished, white incised small juglets,
often with bipartite handles with a design of upright and
pendent triangles filled with a dotted decoration. The bodies
often had a toggle-pin of copper on their left shoulder and a
scarab, mounted originally on a silver ring (which had usually
corroded completely) on the left hand.
In one of the graves of compound I (n/ I3 no. 8) we found a
scarab of King Sebekhotep, perhaps the most important mon-
arch of the 13th dynasty, with the name Khaneferret, i.e.
Sebekhotep IV (± I720 BO). The question arises, how long was
this scarab in use before it was buried? It only marks a terminus a
quo. Scarabs of Sebekhotep were in use during the whole Second
Intermediate Period. A second question is: who was responsible
for the construction of this largest of Canaanite sacred com-
plexes in the Near East? We think the most likely explanation
is to connect this development with the consolidation of the
.MB city state in the Eastern Delta, headed by a local Asiatic
king, who succeeded in gaining suzerainty over nearly the whole
country. This was perhaps Salitis (Slk) in ± I650 BC.2
I Later in the time of str. E/2 this settling area gave way to an open
place.
Z J. von Beckerath, op. cit., p. 269, xv. I; cf. also Berlin, no. 23673.
There is, however, another possibility worthy of mention.
The setting up of an important cult of a major Canaan-
ite god where Avaris was destined to be situated, and where a
terminus a quo was provided by Sebekhotep, King of the 13th
dynasty, may be accounted for by the establishment of a local
dynasty at Avaris towards the end of the Middle Kingdom.
The name of the first king of this local dynasty is unknown,
but his son Nehesy (± I7I5 BC) is known from several monu-
ments as the. first king with the title: beloved of Seth, lord of
Avaris.1 This Seth later became the principal god of the Hyksos,
but he was already established in Avaris by this local dynasty
before the rise of the Hyksos rule." So perhaps the foundation of
our large temples dates back 65 years prior to the Hyksos rule.
Rather surprisingly we found a fragment of an inscribed
limestone block, possibly from a door-jamb or lintel with what
seems to be part of the name of Nehesy (PI. XVIIIa). It was
buried in the area near the front of the main temples within a
Ramesside tree-pit, i.e. not in its original position. Another
fragment of a door-jamb with a part of a male figure bringing
offerings was found on top of the wall of the temple in a sebakh-
pit. It is extremely tempting to bring this major temple into
connection with the foundation of a new dynasty in Avaris
under the father of N ehesy; and it would fit very well into the
absolute chronological scheme generally accepted in Palestinian
archaeology," and also with the first radiocarbon date for Tell
el-Dab'a, str. G.4 This would mean pushing back the beginning
of str. F to at least ± 17I5 BC, but this would not tally very
well with the above-mentioned chronological link with Kerma
and the Cypriot chronology or with historical expectations
in Egypt. It would also make Nehesy a direct ancestor of the
Hyksos whereas his name points rather to the south, to Nubia.
I Ibid., p. 262, XIV. 2. Another parallel epitheton: 'beloved rif Seth, the
Lord of R-Jbt' = 'The entrance into the fertile land', perhaps another earlier
name for Avaris. A similar name R-wltj is attested from the MK-period for
the settlement and temple of Ezbet Rushdi, cf. Sh. Adam, ASAE 56 (1959),
pp. 216-17, pI. IX.
:1. J. von Beckerath, op. cit., p. 161.
3 A date of 1 750 BG for the transition from MB II A to MB II B is accepted
at the time being by the majority: cf. E. Oren, ZDPV 87 (1971), pp. 135-9;
Y. Yadin, op. cit., pp. 107-8; J. M. Weinstein, loco cit. According to Al-
bright, The Archaeology rif Palestine (Harmondsworth 1960), p. 84, the shift
took place in the second half of the rSth century, and later (op. cit., Chicago,
1965, p. 57) he brought the transition forward to about 1700 BG.
4 See p. 233 n. 2.
The second major Canaanite incursion would have happened
shortly before his reign.
In various places beneath the main temple chips of limestone
were found, some of them inscribed, and it looks as if a
major Egyptian monument had stood in its vicinity before the
establishment of the Canaanite temples of str. F and E/3.
Such a building could more suitably be brought into connec-
tion with the stratum G settlement, discussed above and dated
from ± 1725 Be onwards.' This is also the most probable posi-
tion for a temple under the reign of Nehesy from the archaeo-
logical viewpoint. Further remains of such an Egyptian temple
should eventually appear during excavations.
Stratum E 2
Now, in the immediate vicinity of the large sacred area, new
family cemeteries were laid out, while settlements can only be
found in the second row of plots, west of the sacred complex.
One of the cemeteries, complex no. I, 46 X 22 m, has been
almost entirely excavated. This cemetery also had, on its
northern boundary, its own mortuary temple, which reveals
some Egyptian influence, possibly drawn from the nearby
Ezbet Rushdi temple of the r zth dynasty (Fig. 10, PI. XXI).
The broad pro-cella with an asymmetric extension towards
the left, as in the Ezbet Rushdi temple, leads axially into the
tripartite cella. In spite of these signs of Egyptian influence,
the design of the temple proved, on closer inspection, to be
mainly Canaanite. Along the wall, separating the cellas from
the pro-cella, were benches of mud-brick;" the division into
three was obviously a purely formal reproduction of the plan
of an Egyptian temple without having the same functional
significance (see below). In a cavity in the floor of the western
cella was a child's burial, and against a niche in the partition
wall, between the pro-cella and the eastern cella, a big-footed
bowl and tubular libation pipes were found (Fig. I I); they
served, perhaps, as supports for plates of offerings. Below this
assembly was a grave (III I no. I), which belonged to a group
of older graves in stratum F and possibly E/3 (III I no. 1-3).
I See above, pp. 234, 236. A baboon statue of limestone was found in the
entrance hall of the big temple III, but within a sebakh pit. Another baboon
statue of limestone (reg. 2498) was found already destroyed under a wall of
str.· E/3 or F date. This would suggest very strongly to date the Egyptian
limestone statues and inscribed blocks into the period prior to str. F/E/3 and
the large Canaanite sacred district. 2 See p. 257 n. 2.
These graves may have belonged, however, to people whose
descendants had continued to bring offerings, since the interval
between the burials and the erection of the temple was no
more than 25-30 years; and this family cemetery clearly
originated in the older stratum F-cemetery. I
B 8 B
'lEU. e. D6B'A sn:t. Ef2-t

MCRT\JAR'( tEMPL£ I
...
FIG. 10. Tell el-Dab' a mortuary temple I and comparison with MK-temple of Ezbet
Rushdi and temple, str. 2, area H in Hazar
The pro-cella shows again a division into three elements, an

architectural feature which our mortuary temple, together with
the benches attached to the partition wall, has in common with
the MB II C and LB I temple of area H in Hazor, but its size
is more modest."
In the western part of the pro-cella ashes and charred animal
bones (cattle, sheep, pig) were found, and in the eastern part
two large black-polished juglets, one bearing the white incised
design of pendent and upright triangles of a type current in
stratum Ell. Without doubt, this is a ceremonial type of pottery,
much larger than the parallel pottery found in tombs. On the
fioor, ringstands of several sizes were uncovered as well as a
smashed marly-clay vessel (most likely a water zir). Within the
pro-cella and outside the temple votive pottery, consisting of
small bottles, plates, and also standard pottery, such as ring-
~tands and round-bottomed drinking cups, were found buried
111 groups.
I See above, p. 241. 2 Y. Yadin, op. cit., pp. 75-9, figs. 18, 19.
This temple was open towards the north-north-west, and
within the enclosure (str. E/3) behind its sanctuaries in the
south lay a cemetery. It looks as if the three sanctuaries were,
in some way, related to three major graves south of the temple.
The main tomb (m/I2 no. 9), situated behind the middle
sanctuary, had a large chamber, 4.95 X 2.75 m, constructed
19131
., '"
l .-.
,
I
.
"".
FIG_ I I. Mortuary temple I, libation pipes and pottery from an offering niche
of mud-brick and a separate chamber for meat-offerings.

Outside the entrance lay the skeletons of a pair of donkeys.'
According to the evidence of the section walls the vault
was broken and the tomb plundered in the period of stratum
E/2 (PI. XXIIa). Not very long afterwards the two neigh-
bouring tombs were plundered. This throws some light on the
security and morality of the time. We have similar evidence
from other tombs belonging to strata F to D/2.
The chamber of the major tomb contained the remains of an
adult woman and two infants of I i-2 and 6-7 years of age.
The superb quality and workmanship of the surviving pottery
explains why this tomb was worth plundering. Especially
notable are two grey-polished juglets with incised lotus designs,
I M. Bietak, MDIK 26 (1970), pl. XIV/a; J. Boessneck, op. cit., pl. 5/b.
one with birds hovering between lotus stems (Fig. 12). The
technological quality of those juglets, which continue the tradi-
tion of the Lisht ware, was already superior to the standard
products of the time.
FIG. 12. Twojuglets from tomb m/12 no. 9, str. E/2 with lotus and
bird design
Within the cemetery some sub-grouping may be discerned in

an internal dividing wall, which separated the older part (str.
E/3) from the new graves. At this time another cemetery seems
to have been added towards the south-west.
Two. huts within the cemetery complex No. I may have been
used by the ineffective guards. To the west the cemetery and
mortuary temple were separated from a residential complex by a
narrow street. Facing a small structure with a very wide door,
most likely a shop, the street seemed to have been roofed in
a similar way as in villages of the present day in the oases. The
houses had still larger courts attached to them. Burials were
no longer to be found within the residential areas but in family
cemeteries inside the settlement near the sacred area. The
settlement expanded to an enormous size during this time,
reaching as far as Khata'na, I km further west, where recent
excavations (February I979) have revealed a compact settlement
pattern.'
Stratum Ell
The two major temples in the sacred area remained intact
during this period of occupation as we may deduce from the
direct superimposition of Ramesside remains over the eastern
shrine; the surface above the other shrine is completely de-
nuded. That no tombs were sunk or cut into the large temples
from a period prior to the Ramessides allows us to assume that
the temples were in continuous use. In front of the large temple
III there rose a fiat-topped artificial mound lined with mud-
bricks and covering the area of the former offering court. It
was built of earth and a ramp led to its surface from the north.
It is not clear at present whether this ramp was a temporary
builders' ramp used for renovating the temple or a permanent
approach to the top of the mound, which may have served as an
offering-place.
The long, narrow mortuary temple (no. II) of stratum E/3-2
along the western edge of the sacred area gave way to a smaller
rectangular mud-brick building, which was perhaps now a
more simple mortuary temple. The tower at the north-western
edge of the sacred area had collapsed .in the meantime and was
rebuilt further north.> In the immediate vicinity, a series of
tombs shows the continuity of the north-western cemetery (II),
and beyond, in the northern sector of the sacred complex, we
may observe larger and smaller rectangular buildings. In two
cases these structures were erected on top of double graves and
clearly may be regarded as tomb superstructures or chapels.
Round brick structures suggest, on the other hand, silos and a
kind of occupation which started in this cemetery area. Traces
of small huts were also observed during the excavations.
The so-called 'priesthouse' of stratum E/3-2 had been re-
placed by a mud-brick house attached to the mound and ramp
mentioned above. Within and outside this building two
children's burials were found. Some adult burials near by
may belong to the stratum D/3 above.
Additional tombs were sunk within the two cemeteries west
I This campaign was directed by J. Dorner.
2 Because of a pit underneath.
of the sacred complex. The mortuary temple I, described above,
together with str. EI'2 remained intact, although the east wall
had to be renewed, due to a crack in the old wall, when the
vault of a stratum F tomb below collapsed under the weight of
an accumulation of earth.
The building material was now generally mud-brick, which
proved to be much more water-resistant than the sand-bricks of
the previous strata. It had been used before for the construction
of tombs, and especially for the vaults.
The builders of the new tombs clearly avoided areas occupied
by older tombs, which were obviously kept under some kind of
surveillance, but now a new development occurred, namely the
use of the necropolis as a place of habitation.
Small houses and huts were erected in the cemetery areas.
They were simple rectangular buildings with only one or two
rooms. Within the larger buildings we find child-burials be-
neath the doors, a custom which still exists among the fellaheen
in the belief that it will prevent the deaths of other children.
The enclosure wall of cemetery I was not renewed, and the
boundaries of the settlement area are now extended towards
the west. While during stratum EI'2 we find no graves in the
precincts of the dwellings, they appear again here, normally in
pits sunk in the courts or even under the floors of houses.
Besides the normal rectangular mud-brick chamber ('2.5-4.5
m length) covered by a vault, we find less sophisticated graves
in oval or round pits. We still have the tombs of warriors,
carrying battle-axes and daggers; also, the burial of two donkeys
before the entrance to the tomb (11 1'2 no. '2). The normal
mode of burial is in the semi-contracted position, but we also
have burials with bodies nearly extended, lying either on their
backs or on their sides (PI. XXIIb). Orientations continue to vary.
In the pottery of this stratum, new shapes appear (Figs. 13,
14), especially in the black-polished and white incised Tell el-
Yahudiya ware. Bipartite handles became rare, and the rims
of vessels became simple. The standard decoration consists of
three or four sector-zones filled by a comb-pricked pattern
set in a zigzag fashion. This occurs on fairly slim juglets with
button bases (PI. XXXc). There are also small distended
globular juglets which have a band of decoration above and
below their widest diameter; some juglets of this type are
distinctly double conical (PI. XXXa). The same shapes
appear also in the plain black- or red-polished wares.
Everything now is made of local clay. The decoration and
0
1
(0'1)
'.:M
2
FIG. 13. Offerings from tomb mlII no. 7, str. Ell
eUr.9,1D.11
~
~ 1fJ
..11M ~
"
f,B ~ V'.o cj0

~ g'l> ~ a3 Q~
O~ (J ·0
. ~.· ~.••
.
'.
,Q~I:,
, t :
.
. i!
3 0 2. VI :u.. a
FIG. 14. Offerings from tomb 1/12 no. I, str. E/I-D/3
types seem to be typical of the MB II B (3) Culture of the

Delta. The culture had started to develop along its own line and
distinct from Syria and Palestine. Cultural consolidation and
isolation had occurred.
During the time of stratum Ej I, obviously, trade relations with
Cyprus had increased. We have in graves of this stratum Cypriot
juglets of the 'white painted pendent line ware' (PI. XXXIII b), 1
while tombs in Cyprus have yielded Tell el-Yahudiya ware
I M. Bietak, MDIK 23 (1968), pI. XXXI/a; MDIK 26 (1970), pI.
XXII/b.
of Egyptian manufacture of the above-mentioned types of
stratum Ell and D/3.1
Stratum D/3
The tendency to build houses on land previously reserved
for cemeteries continues, even within the sacred area. As far
as can now be seen the northern area of the sacred complex was
occupied by a building with massive walls (Fig. 15). The size
of this building and its foundations are unusual, but interior
fireplaces suggest it was a residential edifice. Graves were un-
covered beneath the floors of most rooms. Some of them
(KI I 4 no. I) were richly furnished and had golden jewellery.
South and south-west of this building, which may very
well have been an extension of a palace, a part of the north-
western cemetery continued to expand, now more to the south
into the originally secluded area before the mortuary temple II,
str. E/3-2. The building, which replaced this mortuary temple,
was still in existence in str. D/3 and was possibly even en-
larged.
Especially noteworthy is a large vaulted chamber of mud-
brick (n/ I 5 no. I) at the western rim of the sacred area,
beside the enclosure wall, which had been renewed in mud-
brick. This tomb had similar dimensions to the major tomb of
cemetery I behind the mortuary temple I (see above, str. E/2)
4.60 x 2.50 m, and it was constructed with strong walls. The
vault had collapsed and the chamber had been plundered,
but still preserved were the remains of three warriors in
a supine position, with knives, battle-axes, and daggers clearly
recognizable. Upon the heads of two warriors parts of golden
diadems were found. The last burial inside the entrance was
found intact. Two golden diadem-bands had been placed upon the
skull, and the handle of a battle-axe was wrapped in an orna-
mented silver sheet. Behind the head of the warrior was an
alabaster ointment jar and beside his right shoulder were found
two pear-shaped marly-clay vessels and a drinking-cup. The
warriors wore scarabs on their fingers and on their necks and
a few wore scarabs on both hands. Unlike the usual practice
of leaving the entrance open across the breadth of the chamber,
this door had especially bonded jambs of mud-bricks. Outside
I P. Astrom, Three Tell el Jahudiyeh Juglets in the Thera Museum. Acta of
the ist International Scientific Congress on the Volcanoof Thera, 15-23 September
1969 (Athens 1971), pp. 415-21; Lit. about Tell el-Yahudiya ware in Cyprus:
ibid., p. 420.
5
there was also a small chamber which contained animal bones
(meat offerings).
This was a tomb of privileged persons, buried very near the
main temple, which had probably remained intact. They
were well armed, and their offerings and the style of burial
'~I
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18
, [ill ~
K
No
I
111
R I
..
FIG. IS. Tell el-Dab'a, settlement of the advanced Hyksos period, str. D/3
already show a stronger Egyptian influence. Beside the two

original burials were placed two wine amphoras, each con-
taining red-polished dipper juglets.
The cemetery areas west of the sacred precinct were now
almost exclusively used for residential purposes. The mortuary
temple was probably already in ruins and out of use. Un-
fortunately this area was completely truncated by the deep
foundations of a Ramesside temple enclosure wall. Only in the
immediate neighbourhood south of this temple did we find
a few tombs. One beside another, houses covered the rest of
the area, only small tracts remaining open. The outlines of the
FIG. 16. Tomb m/15 no. 3, str. D/3
original plots of strata F and E/3 were not altered; internally,

however, they had undergone much partitioning to satisfy the
needs of the increasing number of occupants.
The layout of houses is fairly simple. We have rect-
angular one-room buildings, then houses with a separate inner
room covering one quarter of the total area. We also have two-
room houses to which were added minor rooms. Mainly
children's graves were found within these newly acquired
residential areas, with the exception of two larger tombs (nil 1
no. 4, 0/12 no. 4). It seems that in the immediate vicinity of the
sacred area adults were buried in cramped cemeteries. But this
custom, as excavations in other areas have shown, was not
necessarily the rule throughout the town. In other areas we
have found tombs either within the houses or in the immediate
vicinity and in the same building plot, a feature which, generally,
became the fashion during stratum D/2.
Stratum DI2
As far as we may assume from the present excavations, only
limited areas have remained intact in this stratum, partly
because of sebakh-digging and partly because of the deep founda-
tions of buildings which date from the Ramesside period.
Within the sacred complex no major changes may be recog-
nized. The large building in the northern part of the area still
remained intact but the rectangular building in the north-
west was replaced by other buildings of unknown purpose.
Still, we have evidence of tombs and also of the continuing
use of the two major temples, though the latter may only be
deduced from the fact that the temples were not covered by
any new building until the Ramesside period. It is possible,
however, that from the time of stratum D/3 and onwards these
temples were superseded as places of worship by other buildings
elsewhere in the town and that the older buildings were re-
tained for reasons of sanctity.
In stratum D/2 family chamber-tombs, sometimes in pairs,
were integrated into the architecture of the ground floor of
houses (Fig. 17, PI. XXXVIIb). For the first time shafts were
found leading to the underground chambers and accessible
from a special room or from an open court. The room above the
vault seems to have been, at least in one case, completely
closed. In spite of the greater protection thus afforded, this new
style of construction made access to the chamber easier; and all
tombs of str. D/2 hitherto excavated were plundered. The
offerings seem to have been completely Egyptian. We found no
evidence of Tell el-Yahudiya ware.
While some buildings were divided into several rooms and
seemed to have more than one storey, others were small and
sometimes irregularly rectangular. We also found some very
small houses with massive foundations, which suggest that they
supported tower-like constructions, and this clearly indicates
a lack of space. Even narrow roads were blocked by small
FIG. 17. Houses of the late Hyksos period, str. D/2, with tombs inside the buildings
houses and it seems that, occasionally, the only access to such

houses was by way of another building. As in strata D/3, E/2,
and G we once again have evidence of shops consisting of one
room with a single wide entrance from the street.
This lack of space explains why cemeteries had nearly dis-
appeared and why tombs were constructed within or under the
houses. This situation reminds us of conditions in Tell el-
Ajjul, Megiddo, and especially in Ras Shamra, I where we also
I See W. M. F. Petrie, Ancient Gaza I (London 1931), pl. LIV; Gaza III,
pIs. LXI, LXII. For Megiddo see K. M. Kenyon, Eretz-Israel V (1958),
p. 59; for Ras Shamra see C. F. A. Schaeffer, Syria 16 (1935), p. 175,
pI. XXXVI; Syria 19 (1938), pp. 197-255, figs. 2 ff.; for Mesopotamia see
P. Delougaz et al., loco cit.
have family chamber-tombs in houses or at least in connection
with buildings when settlement became congested behind the
town walls. Perhaps this same explanation could also apply to
Tell el-Dab'a in the late Hyksos period. Although we have not
yet excavated any town walls, they are expected to be found on
or near the shore of the lake, now under the subsoil water.'
The other sides of the tell have been levelled for agriculture.
It seems to us that stratum D/2 may have been the latest
stratum of the Syro-Palestinian MB-Culture in our series, and
it had already become largely Egyptianized. Settlement was
obviously abandoned abruptly, and this may be connected
with the fall of the Hyksos rule in Egypt. All the graves were
plundered, and this is unlikely to have happened while the
buildings were inhabited.
As this stratum was largely destroyed by sebakh-digging and by
Ramesside foundations, it is difficult to see to what extent
destruction had been caused by warfare and by the occupation of
the town by Egyptian forces. No truly indicative evidence has
hitherto been discovered.
Stratum D/ I and hiatus in occupation

Stratum D/l consists only of a deep 3 m strong filling wall
cut deeply into the debris ofD/2. It has roughly the same orienta-
tion as D/2 and exactly the same as the following temple com-
plex of stratum B, further in the north-west. It can only be dated
to the t Sth dynasty by rough vessels for mortar, but the site
was largely abandoned during the time of the r Sth dynasty.
This was completely in accord with our expectations. A site
occupied by Asiatics, who were responsible for the Hyksos
rule in Egypt, is likely to have been abandoned after their
expulsion.
Stratum B
Towards the end of the r Sth dynasty the site was occupied
again and remained so until the end of the 20th dynasty
(c.I3IO-1080 Be). All areas of the tell sufficiently pre-
served to be inspected through excavation were covered by
houses and large walls with north-south and east-west orienta-
tions. In some areas it seems that a single planning body was
responsible for the construction of the town. It was clearly a
new foundation of gigantic dimensions, covering the area from
I At the natural edge of the tell the strata are situated on a lower level
than those inside the mound.
Tell el-Dab'a in the south and extending to Qantir, 2.5 km
in the north, an area of perhaps 4-5 sq. km.
A large temple area, which occupied the highest preserved
section of the tell, had an orientation different from the general
1) 11 11. 13 14 '5 11 17 19 19
lit
N
•
0
Q
(};)
H EL DA A.
R STRATU •.•
FIG. 18. Temple of Sutekh from the time of Horemheb and the rqth dynasty,
surrounded by tree-pits, str. B
pattern. Edouard Naville excavated the enclosure wall and the

inside of this area, reporting the discovery of column bases and
also older remains such as the above-mentioned sphinx statue
of Queen Sobeknofru. I In the meantime, the local farmers
had removed most of the massive walls, which had a thickness
of 20 cubits (10.50 m), and the highest part of the tell was now
separated from the rest by a ditch.
The southern enclosure wall is orientated exactly east-west,
while the eastern wall is parallel to the temple's axis, which
seems to follow an older tradition going back to the H yksos
period (Fig. 18). For this very reason we assumed that, at one
I See p. 226 n. 4.
time, a Canaanite main temple must have stood in the north-
western area of the tell, and its cult was perhaps revived late
in the rSth dynasty.
To whom did this temple belong? We are now in the process
of uncovering the southern section of the enclosed area. There
is a limestone pavement, a large round well, and on the pave-
ment we found a lintel (PI. XXXVIIIa) of a sanctuary dedi-
cated to 'Sutekh, great of might', and bearing the names of King
Horemheb (c. 1332- 1305 BC). I Apart from yielding this in-
scription, the stratum was also dated by blue-painted pottery
(XXXVIIIb) and Mycenaean ware to the late r Sth dynasty
and early 19th dynasty.
Indeed, it seems that a shrine, dedicated to the god Seth,
who was the chief god of the Hyksos in this place, had been
built within this enclosure. This reminds us of the stela of 400
years, found at Tanis, which obviously celebrates a festival
commemorating the establishment of the cult of Seth, most
likely at the site of Avaris, by a vizier Sethi. He is usually
identified with the father of Ramesses II, Sethi I, who seems
to have acted as vizier during the reign of Horemheb." This
new find at Tell el-Dab'a indeed corroborates the original
interpretation of the stela of 400 years. It would commemorate
an event which occurred 400 years before the time of Horemheb,
i.e. in 1720-1705 BC. This is within the supposed reigns of
King Nehesy's father and Nehesy himself, who, most probably,
founded the cult of Seth at Avaris. Previously, we mentioned
the possibility of linking our two large Canaanite temples of
strata F-E/3-2 onwards with the foundation of this cult,'
but there may have been another major temple under the area
of the late rSth-dynasty temple which remained in existence
throughout the Ramesside period.
We should also mention that this huge temple area, dating
from the end of the rSth and r qth dynasty and dedicated
perhaps to Seth, was surrounded within and without the
ternenos-wall by an immense number of trees so laid out in a
formal pattern that they conformed with the orientation of the
temenos-wall (Fig. 18). The tree-pits reached deep down into
I M. Bietak, AfO 23 (1970), p. 203, fig. 32.

2 K. Sethe, ZAS 65 (I930), pp. 85-9;J. von Beckerath, Tanis und Theben
(Gluckstadt-Hamburg-New York I952), pp. 38-4I; W. HeIck, CdE 4I
(I966), pp. 234-41. See, however, R. Stadelmann, CdE 40 (I965), pp. 46-60;
H. Goedicke, CdE 4I (I966), pp. 23-39; L. Habachi, Tell el-Dab'a I (in
preparation). 3 See above, p. 255 f.
the subsoil. From the type of pits we may conclude that the trees
were palm-trees but we have also found the remains of perhaps
the largest sacred grovel ever found in an excavation. In
Ramesside times the trees outside the temenos walls were
replaced by the town site mentioned above, which was con-
sciously planned and enormous. Therefore, the temple referred
to above was the first construction on the new town site after
the Hyksos period and was followed by the construction of other
settlement buildings.
At the northern edge of the main temple, on the shore of the
lake, we found, apart from holes perhaps used for mooring-
posts, a huge system of walls, which we are now in the process
of excavating. They may very well have been fortification
walls, erected some time after the foundation of the settlement
for defence against the raiding sea peoples, whose ships en-
tered the mouths of the Nile, especially during the reign of
King Ramesses III.
Habitation continued, however, and those walls were even-
tually topped with houses, which may date from the time of
the 21st dynasty. We know that at this period the town
was still in existence, because inscribed stones of Siamun- and
Psusennes II3 have been found there, but afterwards it was
abandoned for several hundred years.
Stratum A
Finally, in the 3rd century Be, the site was again occupied
and an unimportant settlement spread over the entire tell, but
it is preserved only on some of the highest parts of the mound.
Its existence is, however, sufficiently attested by the evidence
found in other areas of potsherds left on the surface by the sebakh
diggers.
IV. The reconstruction of the historical geography in the environment

of the site and its identification with Avaris and Piramesse
To summarize briefly, apart from the later remains there is
evidence, extending through a series of strata, of a huge town
site of an Asiatic (Canaanite) community of the Syro-Palestinian
Middle Bronze Age Culture II A and B in the north-eastern
I Tree-pits have been found as far as 65 m distant from the temenos-walI.
2 E. Naville, The Shrine of Saft el-Henneh and the Land of Goshen, EEF, Mem.
5 (London 1887), pl. 9/E.
3 A limestone fragment with the name of Psusennes II was recently found
by a farmer in the land west of Tell el-Dab'a.

Nile Delta from the time of the 13th dynasty until the beginning
of the r Sth dynasty. Although several other sites of this culture
have been discovered and identified since the beginning of our
excavations,' Tell el-Dab'a is the largest and most impressive
of all the sites, and, by its fine stratigraphic series and abundant
excavated material, the most representative.
This offspring of the Middle Bronze Age Culture in the
eastern Nile Delta had the same origin as the culture in Pales-
tine and Syria, represented in the phases MB II A and even
MB II B I. Pottery from those early phases, especially the jug-
lets, shows very distinct links with coastal Syria. Later, as a
result of different, especially prosperous, environmental in-
fluences this culture at the eastern edge of the Nile Delta
acquired its own special characteristics. Many of those character-
istics may be observed in southern Palestine as far as Gaza
(Tell el-Ajjul). The rest of Palestine followed a different course
of cultural development, differing in many respects from that of
coastal Syria; but the influence of the highly developed MB-
Culture of the Nile Delta extended to the borders of Palestine.
The topographical differences in the Syro-Palestinian Middle
Bronze Age Culture have not yet been defined exactly, but
they have been observed." All three areas have, of course,
very much in common. They also have individual features,
which should be investigated more closely because they may
lead to important historical conclusions. In an appendix (see
below, pp. 283-8) we shall present a sketch of a cultural
pattern, valid for the region from the eastern Delta to Gaza,
which was very probably under Hyksos rule, but our list of items
will also include some pre-Hyksos features.
The Canaanite community at the eastern edge of the Delta
was naturally influenced more and more by Egyptian culture,
but it continued to have its own characteristic features such as
burials in front of house-doors, cemeteries within the settlement
and eventually graves under the house-floors, contracted
burials, servant-burials, roasted joints of mutton and pork
placed as offerings in the graves, burials of sacrificed donkeys,
a wide range of Syro-Palestinian pottery shapes and distinctive
bronzes. Male burials with weapons show the warrior nature of
the inhabitants.
The community had trade relations with the Eastern Mediter-
ranean, especially with Cyprus, and also with Upper Egypt.
I C£ M. Bietak, Tell el-Dab'a II, fig. 35.
2 K. M. Kenyon, CAH2.
Perhaps they profited from trade with those two regIOns.
There is even a possibility that the establishment of the MB
II AJB-Culture in the eastern Nile Delta was caused by close
trade relations between Egypt and Byblos during the late r zth
and 13th dynasties (str. G). The temples of str. EJ 3-2 are Can-
aanite, and the size of the main sacred area excavated thus
far shows that we have here, at the beginning of the Second
Intermediate Period, the most important city-state of the Syro-
Palestinian Middle Bronze Age Culture in the eastern Nile
Delta. It is not difficult to deduce, therefore, that this Asiatic
community, after it had had time to establish itselfin the eastern
Nile Delta, must have been responsible for the Hyksos rule in
Egypt. It showed scant regard for Egyptian tradition; indeed,
in some respects its attitude was hostile to it. Two small offering
tables of bronze, both of King Neferhotep I (± 1741-1730 Be) of
the 13th dynasty, were intentionally mutilated (Pl. XXXVb);
the images of the king, the protective uraei, and the names of
the king were mutilated by nails. A head of a fine Middle
Kingdom private statue, probably placed originally within a
temple area, was used as a grindstone (PI. XXXVa).1 In some
respects these acts of vandalism bear out the remarks of Queen
Hatshepsut in the Speos Artemidos (Urk. IV. 390) that she had
restored what had been neglected since the Asiatics were in
Avaris.
After a break in occupation we have evidence of a huge
pre-planned town of the Ramesside Period covering 4-5 sq. krn.
All the evidence taken together-the cultural and the strati-
graphic-would fit well the identification of the site on the one
hand with the capital of the H yksos, Avaris, and on the other
hand with the Delta residence of the Ramessides, Piramesse,
as already maintained by M. Hamza, W. C. Hayes, L. Habachi,
and John van Seters,> But this conclusion has necessarily
involved us in the long-standing controversy about the localiza-
tion of those old capitals of Egypt.
When we started our archaeological operations at Tell el-
Dab'a, Egyptologists in general accepted the opinion of Pierre
Montet, who identified Tanis with Avaris and Piramesse, or, at
I M. Bietak, MDIK23 (1968), pI. XXX/a; MDIK 26 (1970), pI. XVIII/c,

d;J. M. Weinstein, BASOR 213 (1974), pp. 49-57, and BASOR 217 (1975),
pp. 1-16, presented reasons for supposing that Middle Kingdom statues and
goods came to Palestine by plundering of Egyptian cemeteries during the
Hyksos period.
2 Cf. p. 229 ns. 3, 4, 7, p. 231 n. 1.
least they attempted to find a compromise solution, identifying
Piramesse with the sacred area at Tanis and locating the royal
residence at Qantir. Enormous quantities of stone monuments
of the r qth dynasty and even some of the Hyksos time at Tanis
seemed to prove by their inscriptions the identity of that site
with Avaris and Piramesse; at Tell el-Dab'a-Qantir, however,
inscriptional material is almost completely Iacking.! The
reasoning of Labib Habachi and John van Seters- that the stone
monuments at Tanis had been transferred there from the area
of Tell el-Dab'a-Qantir did not convince scholars at the time.
It seemed to us that the problem could only be solved by
further excavations at those sites and by a scientific study of the
ancient geography of the Nile Delta, not only to settle the
specific question whether monuments had been transferred to
Tanis from Tell el-Dab'a-Qantir, but also to check whether
Piramesse and Avaris could possibly have been situated some-
where else.
We found immediately that the combining of archaeology
with the study of ancient geography and geomorphology led
us. into a fascinating field of study where little work had pre-
viously been done and everything was still to be discovered.
The first problem we tried to settle was the reconstruction of
the geographical environment of the sites in question during the
second millennium Be. Geographical conditions have changed
considerably since then.
Our first aim was to reconstruct the plan of the ancient
water-courses and drainage systems, which provided the main
routes for traffic and the sources of irrigation as well as setting
the natural boundaries of the various provinces within the
area. But how were we to find the ancient water-branches
again?
River branches left quantities of sediment along their banks
and on their beds, thereby forming levees along the banks and
finally sedimentation ridges, diminishing in height the further
they extended inland from the river. It follows, therefore, that
the ancient Nile branches, at least those of some size, should be
detectable on a contour map in the successive tongue-like
contour lines.
I At the end of the nineteenth century numerous limestone blocks were
excavated and burnt by natives in this region in order to produce lime; cf.
F. Ll. Griffith in: W. M. F. Petrie, Nebesheli 21m and Defenneli (Tahpanhes),
EEF, Mem. 4 (London 1888), p. 45, and E. Naville, loco cit.
Z See p. 230 n. I, p. 231 n. I.
In working through the Survey of Egypt contour maps of the
Nile Delta, 1 : 100,000 or 1 : 25,000, it is indeed possible to
trace most of the major waterways from their elevations and
also to plot the main drainage systems and overflow lakes.
Very often contours of ancient shore lines, preserved in the
inshore lakes along the Delta coast, show the sedimentation
action of ancient river branches very well, as, for instance, a
certain variation of the later-known Tanitic branch, which
can be easily traced in islands of the Manzala lake. Those old
shorelines belonged to stages of regression of the Mediterranean
when its level sank, and this happened most probably in
predynastic and early dynastic times.' An old variation of the
Pelusiac branch of the Nile can also be recognized in this way.
Not all the watercourses, detectable in the contour maps and
topographical maps or with the help of satellite photography,"
were active at the same period, of course. We were, there-
fore, compelled to find a method of dating the activity of the
various branches and watercourses, which changed in Antiquity,
in order to trace the topography of the Delta during different
historical periods. Literary sources before the time of Herodotus
give only very limited assistance in identifying the Pharaonic
names of Nile branches. They consist mainly of onomastica or
place-names in sacred temple lists. The most satisfactory
approach is to date the historical Nile branches from the
archaeological remains of the settlements and cemeteries
along their banks.
I t is reasonable to assume that if there is a concentration of
settlements of a given period along the banks (levees) of a
certain watercourse, that watercourse was active at the same
period.
It was possible through this study to gain many very interest-
ing details of the ancient historical geography of the Nile Delta.
A few results with a bearing on the identification of our
own site may be mentioned.
Our reconstruction of the upper course of the Pelusiac
branch of the Nile agrees, in general, with the results already
obtained by Ali Shafei and Omar Toussoun-, but we were able
to provide more details. Furthermore, we could trace the
I M. Bietak, Tell el-Dab'a II (Vienna 1975), p. 68, fig. 6; pp. 85 f., 99 f.
2 Ibid., pp. 47-112; K. W. Butzer, Early Hydraulic Civilization (Chicago
1976), p. 24, fig. 4; Rushdi Said (in preparation).
3 A. Shafei, BSGE 21 (1946), pp. 235, 239, figs. I, 2; O. Toussoun,
Memoire sur les anciennes branches du Nil, (Cairo 1922).
branch which linked ancient Heliopolis with the course of the
Nile. The direction of this branch is completely in line with
the axis of the temple of He1iopolis. We have even found on the
contour map the point at which the Heliopolis channel joins
the Pelusiac branch.
o ANCIENT SITES
• SJTn Of 'THE ,..I:t B -C"Ul.TURE
_._,---- DRAIM
----- ANCIENT RO.4.D
FIG. 19. The Eastern Delta, ancient sites and watercourses
One of the most interesting results concerns the neighbour-

hood of the old city of Bubastis (Fig. 19). Contour maps clearly
show that the ancient Pelusiac branch did not follow the same
course as the modern Bahr Abu el-Akhdar, as A. Shafei sug-
gested,' but was once either united with the Tanitic branch or at
least flowed in its immediate vicinity and parallel to it, leaving
Bubastis on its eastern bank. This corresponds closely with
the very accurate details of the position of the towns in relation
I A. Shafei, op. cit., p. 234, pl. I; cf. also O. Toussoun, op. cit., 14, pI. VI.
AV ARIS AND PIRAMESSE
to ancient watercourses given by Ptolemy, and also with other
evidence from Pharaonic Egypt. 1
Another interesting discovery was that the western part of
the Wadi Tumilat, with three closed metre-contour lines, had
once been an ancient overflow lake, taking the surplus from the
drains which issued into it. Along the shorelines of this lake
there are several archaeological sites. We do not know exactly
when the lake became dry in Antiquity, but we do know that it
continued to exist, though divided into several lakes, at least
until Ramesside times, because the Papyrus Anastasi VI
mentions the passing of some Edomite tribes to the lakes of
Pithom.s It now becomes clear why, at least from the time of
the Middle Kingdom onwards, the Wadi Tumilat region was
identified with the Eastern Harpoon nome, which is only
understandable if the waters there were plentiful enough for
fishing." Few Egyptologists have hitherto understood why the
Wadi Tumilat at that time was called the Eastern Harpoon
nome. We now know the reason.
As mentioned above, it may be observed that the Pelusiac
branch joined the same huge sedimentation ridge as the
Tanitic branch north of Bubastis, and this could explain
another problem concerning Egyptian history and historical
geography. Our investigations suggest that during certain
periods the Pelusiac branch flowed into the Tanitic branch,
while at other times the Tanitic branch joined the Pelusiac
branch. In this connection it is significant that the sites of the
Second Intermediate Period and of the Ramesside period+
are numerous along the Pelusiac branch, including its lower
reaches, but sites of those periods have not yet been found
along the Tanitic branch, with the exception of the much-
disputed evidence at Tanis. On the other hand, sites of the
22nd to 25th dynasties, which have not been found along the
northern course of the Pelusiac branch, are to be found along
the Tanitic branch. By that time the Pelusiac branch had
split near its mouth at the Mediterranean. This process hap-
pened most probably during the New Kingdom (site evidence,
Tell el-Makhzan). In consequence we find artificial mounds
many kilometres in length, showing that an enormous effort
was made to dredge the branch and to keep it open for naviga-
tion.! This may lead us to the conclusion that from the zoth
I M. Bietak, op. cit., pp. 125-39, 146. 2 Ibid., p. 90.
3 Ibid., pp. 89 f., 163. 4 Ibid., pp. ro2-3, ro8, 167 (fig. 35), 216.
5 Ibid., p. 216.
dynasty onwards the Pelusiac branch was silted up and the
main stream flowed along the Tanitic branch at Bubastis.
This situation seems to have continued until the 26th dynasty,
the Saite period.
These changes in the course of the river provide an explana-
tion for the absence of Third Intermediate Period sites along the
lower part of the Pelusiac branch and they also throw some
light on the distribution of political units during the late
Libyan period: the kings of the 22nd dynasty held the territories
of Renefer (Tanis) and Bubastis as well as the territory around
Athribis, while the chieftains of the Ma at Pisopdu occupied the
territory along the eastern arm of the Pelusiac branch, the
modern Bahr el-Shibini and its continuation to the north,
which provided an excellent natural boundary between
Bubastis and Pisopdu.' It is very interesting to note that a
channel, which once linked the Pelusiac branch at Qantir with
the Tanitic branch at Tanis, can be dated, according to three
sites along its banks, to the time of the 22nd dynasty. Most
probably this channel brought also the waters of the eastern
arm of the Pelusiac branch of the Nile to the Tanitic mouth.
In such conditions it is understandable that it was most
probably the silting up of the Pelusiac branch and the loss of the
natural protection afforded by the huge Bahr el-Baqar drainage
system in the east that caused the transfer of the capital of
Egypt, from Tell el-Dab'a-Piramesse to Tanis, the only suit-
able harbour remaining at this time. The stones and monu-
ments of the city of Piramesse were transported by the kings of
the 21St and 22nd dynasty to their new residences, not only to
Tanis, but also to Bubastis. Parts of the same monuments
were transferred to both sites, as Labib Habachi has shown in
the case of some statues and columns with palm-leaf capirals.'
No single monument of the Ramesside period has, however,
been found at Tanis in situ. Each had been removed from their
original site and transferred there, in some instances after
being broken from their bases. Such a procedure may explain
why Professor J. Yoyotte- found at Tanis a statue which had
been provided with toes of lime-coated mud; the original feet
I M. Bietak, op. cit., p. r68, fig. 36.

Z L. Habachi, Tell el-Dab'a I (in preparation). The columns in question
are of Old Kingdom origin and were reused during the time of the 19th
dynasty for a temple and the second time during the reign of the 22nd
dynasty, but then distributed in two places in order to be reused for major
temples in Tanis and Bubastis. 3 Personal communication.
and the base had been left most likely behind somewhere at
Qantir. No matching joints have yet been found between
broken monuments at Qantir and Tanis, because only a few
pieces of sculpture seem to have survived at Qantir, but the
archaeological evidence is clear enough even without such
proof. Furthermore, excavations at Tanis over many years
have not produced evidence of a single stratum dating from
before the z rst dynasty. Besides Bubastis, it seems that other
ancient sites, like Tanis, also profited from the destruction of
monuments at Piramesse. I
What was not understood until now is the fact that, by the
transfer of the Ramesside monuments, the cults of the gods of
Ramesses at Piramesse, very special cults indeed, were also
transferred to the new capitals of the 22nd dynasty. Many
hundred years later, in the fourth century BO, when the memory
of the original location of Piramesse had been forgotten, secon-
dary cults of the gods of Ramesses of Piramesse existed in
Tanis, according to the evidence of two statues of generals
found there, and we also know that cults of a similar kind
existed at Bubastis.> This evidence suggests that in the late
period some Egyptians identified Piramesse with Tanis while
others believed it was located in the neighbourhood of Bubastis.
This fact, not only reasonably but also chronologically, explains
very well the difficulties encountered by post-exilic Jewish
scholars from the third century BO onwards in locating the site
'Raamses' of the Exodus (i.e. Piramesse) and their identification
of it with Tanis or with some place in the vicinity of Bubastis.
According to the Septuagint- the Exodus took place via the
Wadi Tumilat, in the neighbourhood of Bubastis, but accord-
ing to Psalm 78 the city 'Raamses' is very clearly connected
with Tanis." These two interpretations can now be explained
as resulting from the fact that secondary cults of the gods of
Piramesse were conducted concurrently and independently
from the 4th century BO onwards, at both Tanis and Bubastis.
Piramesse, however, was situated between those two places
at Tell el-Dab'a-Qantir, -.It was undoubtedly the place of
1 e.g. Tell el-Muqdam (L. Habachi, op. cit.).
2 L. Borchardt, Cat. Gen. Nos. 1-1294, vol. iii (Cairo 1930), pp. 32-4
(no. 689), pp. 41-3 (no. 700); J. Yoyotte, Ann. de l' Ecole Pratique des Hautes
Etudes 79 (1971-72), pp. 172 f.; E. N aville, Bubastis, EEF, Mem. 8 (London
1891), pI. 46jB, C.
3 Gen. 46. 28-9 clearly has Ramesse in the vicinity of Wadi Tumilat
(Heroonpolis) in mind.
4 M. Bietak, op. cit., p. 218.
T
origin of the stone-blocks, whose inscriptions eventually led to
the development of the two cults in later times.
Further work on the tracing of ancient Nile branches led
us to realize that the Pelusiac branch had undergone substantial
changes in its lower course. A very deep channel, which can
be seen on recent survey maps across the Suez Canal area,
marks the course of the classical Pelusiac branch.' It was
formed by a phase of vertical erosion, due to the deep level of
the Mediterranean at that time.
We have already mentioned an old course of the Pelusiac
branch, which can be connected with some ancient shorelines in
the Manzala lake and also a channel, which was most probably
open during the time from the Middle Kingdom and until
the end of the eoth dynasty. Its existence is traceable by the
enormously long mounds of dumps along its southern bank.
This latter course alone provided a connection with a big lake,
north of the Isthmus of Qantara, along the Horus road, and
we know from administrative papyri of the Ramesside period
that it was possible to reach Piramesse along the waterway from
Sile, the frontier fortress and the first fortress on the Horus
road to Palestine." Most probably this elongated lake can be
identified with the Shi-Hor (the Lake of Horus) well known from
Egyptian texts, and it is also mentioned in the Old Testament
as marking the frontier of Egypt.
South of the Isthmus of Qantara we have the Ballah lakes,
which can very probably be identified with PJ-lwfy, mentioned
in Ramesside texts parallel to the Shi-Hor» Its name, being in
part homonymous with Yam-suph, the Sea of the Reeds of the
Old Testament, suggests a later association of the two by the
compilers of the Exodus.
A channel through the Isthmus of Qantara was first noticed
by the French expedition under Napoleon Bonaparte; it was
called the 'separating water', Ti-dnyt, and it is represented on
the northern outer wall of the hypostyle hall of the temple of
Karnak. This was exactly the place where the boundary
fortress of Sile was 'to be expected+ Furthermore, the long
I M. Bietak, pp. 84-6; A. Sneh and T. Weissbrod, Science 180 (6.4.1973),

pp. 59-61, and American Scientist, vol. 63, no. 5 (Sept.s-Oct. 1975), pp. 245-8.
2 Pap, Anastasi v, 24. 3-7 (transport of stelae from the residence to Sile
and Tr-t t-Rt-mssio-mry-Imn, cf. A. H. Gardiner, JEA 6, 1919, pp. 106 f.).
3 See p. 282 n. 2.
4 A. H. Gardiner, op. cit., pI. XI. Sile (Zaru) is therefore most probably
not identical with Tell Abu el-Seifa, which was perhaps Mesen.
narrow mound dumped south of the Pelusiac branch, which
should probably be dated to the New Kingdom, was cut through
by a channel (as can be seen on contour maps) in order to allow
ships to enter the lake which we identify with Shi-Hor, and
thence to reach the border fortresses east of Sileo
In connection with the reconstruction of the ancient geo-
graphy of the Nile Delta, mention should also be made of the
position of the Butic River, said by Ptolemy and, indirectly,
also by Flavius Josephus to link in Roman times all seven
Delta branches of the Nile from east to west.' It was a canal
and its mounds of dumps are still visible in some places,
especially between Mendes and Tanis.> It was the geographer
John Ball who first recognized that those mounds of dumps
must mark the course of the ancient Butic canal. Along this
east-west line we find many of the most important towns of
the Nile Delta (Fig. I9), as, for instance, Heracleopolis Parva,
Tanis, Mendes, Baqliya, Sebennytos, and further to the west
Sais, although there the canal follows a more northerly course
in order to avoid becoming a sedimentation trap. Most of these
towns had been capitals of nomes and we may conclude that
the Butic canal only replaced an earlier road which crossed the
Nile Delta. The main branches of the river must have been
crossed by boat.
The geographical evidence pointing to the location of
Avaris and Piramesse at Tell el-Dab'a-Qantir is in complete
agreement with the evidence provided by administrative and
literary texts and by tradition. These sources furnish many
descriptive details of Avaris and Piramesse, of which the
following are among the most instructive. According to the
Manethonian tradition, Avaris was situated in the nome of
Sethroe, east of the Bubastic river." An ostracon published by
Sir Alan Gardiner+ mentions, as the easternmost branch of
the Nile called 'The Waters of Avaris', a branch otherwise
generally known by its traditional name of the 'Water of
Re:', From the inception of the nome system of organization
I J. Ball, Egypt in the Classical Geographers (Cairo 1942), p. 129.
2 Ibid. and M. Bietak, op. cit., plan IV.
3 Africanus and Eusebius version (Syncellus, pp. 113, I I4) and Armenian
version (Chronica i. 99), which would correspond roughly to the I4th Lower
Egyptian nome. Concerning the situation east of the Bubastic River, cf.
Josephus, Contra Apionem i. 14. 78. The Bubastic River was the easternmost
branch and issued according to Ptolemy at Pelusium into the Mediterra-
nean Sea.
4 A. H. Gardiner, JEA 10 (1924), p. 92.
in the Nile Delta this branch was administered by the nome of
Heliopolis.1
Piramesse, according to statements in Ramesside letters,
was connected by water with Sile, with Shi-Hor, and with
PJ-Jwjy, all of which were situated on the eastern border of
Egypt.> Piramesse was also situated near the eastern frontier,
and Gardiner produced evidence to show that it lay east of the
'Waters of Rer'. 3
This evidence alone would be enough to remove Tanis

from contention, but the direct evidence pointing to Tell el-
Dab'a-Qantir is even more precise. Jean Yoyotte found in the
Pushkin Museum in Moscow+ an inscription on a shrine dating
from the zoth dynasty which mentioned a 'temple of Amun of
Ramesses, great of victories, at the harbour of Avaris'. The epithet
'great of victories' belonged to Piramesse and its gods. This
inscription, which has hitherto received little attention, indi-
cates that the name of Avaris was still in use in Ramesside
times, specifying that part of Piramesse which lay near its
harbour.
In the r qth and zoth dynasties Tell el-Dab'a was part of
a large town site which extended from Qantir, in the north,
to Tell el-Dab'a, in the south. It was already occupied during
the Middle Kingdom and the Second Intermediate Period by an
Asiatic population who lived around a lake fed by a channel
from the Pelusiac branch of the Nile. A drain issued into the
extensive Bahr el-Baqar drainage system in antiquity. This
lake offered ideal harbour facilities and eventually it provided
Piramesse with its harbour.
According to the Papyrus Anastasi IV the boundaries of
Piramesse were marked by some of its main temples, 'the
House of Sutekh being in the south'. The southern extremity of the
whole Ramesside complex is marked by Tell el-Dab'a, and it
was there that we found a huge temenos wall surrounded by
groves. Within an enclosed area of 150 x 100 m we found,
at the beginning of our excavations, a lintel dedicated to
the god Sutekh! and bearing the names of King Horemheb.
This evidence agrees exactly with the location given in the
papyrus.
Viewing the evidence as a whole, we can say that Tell
I M. Bietak, op. cit., p. 162.
2 Pap. Anastasi iii, 2. 8-9, 2. 12, Pap. Anastasi v, 24· 3-7.
3 M. Hamza, ASAE 30 (1930), pp. 43-5; M. Bietak, op. cit., 200.
4 Moscow I, Ia-4867 (J. Yoyotte, op. cit., 172). 5 See p. 270 n. I.
el-Dab'a-Qantir fulfils nearly all the known requirements of
Avaris and Piramesse. There are the royal palace and the living
quarters of the high Ramesside functionaries which were
excavated by M. Hamza and Labib Habachi at Qantir, I a
large harbour, which was occupied during the Middle Kingdom
and Hyksos times, and a temple of the god Sutekh in the south.
Furthermore, the unique strategic position of the site, on the
Pelusiac branch of the Nile is certainly significant. Protection
on the east was provided by the huge overflow lakes of the
Bahr el-Baqar, leaving only a small opening in the north
between the Pelusiac branch and the Bahr el-Baqar system,
through which invaders could enter the Delta. This opening
was guarded by Tell el-Dab'a-Qantir, The site also had ideal
inland harbour facilities for shipping, as well as waterways to
connect it with the south, with the Mediterranean and with
the frontier fortresses, including Sile and the first fortress on
the Horus road.
All this evidence taken together-archaeological, epigraph i-
cal, and geographical-seems to me to make it certain that
Avaris and Piramesse were situated at Tell el-Dab'a and Qantir.
No other site in the eastern Delta bears comparison with it
topographically or satisfies so many of the other desiderata.
The old splendour of the two cities has vanished completely
because of quarrying, plundering, and later land-reclamation.
Nevertheless, archaeology, by using modern methods, is able to
reconstruct, at least in outline, the chief features of the two
old cities which played such an important role in the history
of the Near East.
APPENDIX: SUMMARY OF THE CHARACTERISTICS OF

THE MIDDLE BRONZE AGE CULTURE IN THE
EASTERN NILE DELTA
Only a general summary of the whole body of material associated

with the Middle Bronze Age Culture in the eastern Nile Delta can be
presented here, because it is impossible to include the whole corpus of
material culture. We must realize, however, that special architectural
features were bound to evolve in a different local environment where
I M. Hamza, op. cit.; L. Habachi, ASAE 52 (1954), pp. 489-559'

stones were lacking; consequently it is clear that buildings which were
constructed in stone in Palestine and Syria would be made of mud-brick
in the Egyptian Delta. Also tomb-chambers could not be hewn in bed
rock, but had to be built within a pit, using mud-brick as building
material. Any future comparative cultural analysis must take such
local factors into consideration.
We shall divide our survey into three sections, describing separately the
chief characteristics of which the first two are especially significant from
a cultural point of view : (I) sacred, (2) funerary, (3) domestic. Many of
the features to be mentioned are found in Palestine and Syria, while
some seem to be peculiar to the eastern Delta. Some of these latter
features are surely .of Egyptian origin. Lastly we should append a
corpus of the material culture, which, however, can only be summarized
here.
I. Characteristics of Sacred Elements
I. I Large central sacred precinct consisting of different kinds of

temples (Fig. 8).
1.2 Main temple with massive walls, broad cella ('Breitraum') and
rectangular apsidial niche, axial system! (Fig. 9).
1.3 1.2 with a narrow corridor-like pro-cella, followed by second
pro-cella or assembly hall.s
1.4 Use of double walls with filling as constructional elements for
sacred buildings.i
1.5 Door leading from the pro-cella or the cella to the left, either to
the outside or into an adjoining room.s
1.6 Forecourt in front of the entrance to the temple surrounded by
other buildings.
Some similarities have to be mentioned between the buildings
east and west of the forecourt at Tell el-Dab'a, str. E/3 and
Megiddo, as reconstructed by C. Epstein.s There, as at Tell el-
Dab'a also, the buildings lining the east of the court bound a
narrow passage. The buildings west of the forecourt have in both
temple complexes a very long casemate-like appearance. At Tell
el-Dab'a, the western side is occupied by a mortuary temple.
I Cf. Alalakh VII; Hazor, area H, str. 2 and 3; cf. p. 249 n. 4.
2 Alalakh VII; to some extent Hazor, area H, str. I (LB).
3 Hazor, area F, 'double temple', cf. P.250 n. 1.
4 At Tell el-Dab'a the main temple III has a door leading to the left
towards the adjoining temple V. The mortuary temple II has two rooms
attached to the left, Cf. G. Loud, Megiddo II, DIP 62 (Chicago 1948), figs.
180, 394. Other temples in Palestine show also rooms attached to the right
of the temple's axis.
5 IE] 15 (1965) 2 I I, fig. 1. See other reconstructions of the sacred precinct
of Megiddo by 1. Dunayevsky and A. Kempinski, Eretz Israel II (1973),

PP·8-29·
AV ARIS AND PlRAMESSE
1. 7 Rectangular alter (bamah) covered with ashes, in front of the
temple.'
1.8 Offering pits in the vicinity of the bamah, in front of the temple,
filled with offering pottery and burnt animal bones.>
1.9 A special small room, attached to the front corner of the
temple.!
1.10 Place at the front of the temple, especially marked by, e.g., a
column base, used secondarily there.s
I.II Long narrow (mortuary) temple facing a court, with two
entrances leading into a narrow broad hall. A door on the left
side leads through the wall into one or two adjoining smaller
rooms.s
1.12 Near the temples, especially beside 1.11, a free-standing tower."
1.13 Mortuary temple with tripartite sanctuary and a pro-cella
extending asymmetrically towards the left of the axis.? Pro-cella
divided from entrance area by two tongue-like walls.f
1.14 Benches constructed of mud-brick within the temple, in the
cella and pro-cella, attached to the dividing wall between both
roorns.?
I. I 5 Offering places (niches) within the temple, with libation pipes
and footed bowls for offerings. They are situated above tombs.
1. 16 Foundation trenches and site of temple burnt (purified by
burning) before construction starts.
1.17 Pits containing small votive pottery (bottles and plates) on a
sand bed. Similar pits were found in residential areas, in ceme-
teries and near the mortuary temples.
2. Funerary Characteristics
2. I Tombs beside a house, within the enclosed area of the building
(str. G, F, E/3, Ell, D/3).
2.2 Tombs in family cemeteries within a settlement, near a sacred
I Hazor, area H, str. 2, loco 2534 and 2554 (Y. Yadin, Hazer, Schweich
Lectures [970, London 1972, p. 71); Shechem (G. E. Wright, Shechem, New
York 1964, fig. 56); Nahariya (M. Dothan, IE] 6, 1956, fig. I).
2 O. Tufnell, LachishII (London 1940), pp. 43-4; y. Yadin, op. cit., p. 103.
3 Hazor, area H, str. 2; Alalakh IV.
4 See above, p. 249 n. 3.
5 Cf. p. 252 n. I.
6 Similar towers were found at Tell el-Ajjul and Shechem (cf. p. 252 n. 2).
7 This is to be considered as a sign of Egyptian influence, cf. the nearby
temple of the r sth dynasty at Ezbet Rushdi (fig. 10).
8 Hazor, area H, str. 2 and 3.
9 Ibid.
area (str. F-EjI, Dj3).I Some cemeteries with their own mortuary
temples.
2.3 In strata of cramped settlements tombs under houses or even
connected with the house structure (Dj3-2).z
2.4 Vaulted tomb-chambers, constructed of mud-brick within a
pit and built with nearly vertical courses. Normally every
second course of the vault rests on half a brick, projecting from
the vault's base (G-D/3). This kind of chamber may be very
small and simple, only half a brick thick or large, with walls of
one and a half bricks in thickness.
2.5 Vaulted chamber with a brick-built shaft leading down to the
entrance. The vault is normally high and steep. The floor of the
tomb pit is normally covered by a layer of gravel or coarse sand.
The filling of the shaft outside the chamber also consists of sand
(str. D/2). This method of construction can be considered as
being Egyptian.
2.6 Double chambers appear frequently in nearly all strata with
tombs, but this feature is also found in MK-necropoleis.
2.7 Only the upper part of the body is protected by a rudimentary
brick vault (str. E/I, F).
2.8 One to three burials in a chamber.
2.g Burials in contracted position with the head normally placed
near the entrance. The upper part rests as a rule on the back,
the heels are normally placed under the pelvis, while the thighs
are generally at an angle of goO, or at least a wide angle, in
relation to the upper part of the body, str. G-D/3.
2.10 Burial in nearly extended position and legs only slightly flexed
(F-D/3)·
2. I I Burial on back, legs slightly contracted with knees upwards
(G, F).
2.12 Warrior burials: usually adult males, equipped with battle-axes
and daggers in a leather or copper belt. Sometimes a lance head
is found (G-D/3).
2.13 Children's burials in amphoras. The neck and shoulder of the
vessel were smashed in order to create a bigger opening, which
was often covered with a plate.
2.14 Children's graves in roofed mud-brick chambers. The lining
of the walls is half a brick in thickness and the pointed roof
consists of six or eight courses of bricks laid in pairs.
I The context of the 'courtyard cemetery' should be reconsidered in this
matter.
2 P. Lapp, BASOR 195 (1969), p. 28; W. H. Stiebing, ]NES 30 (1971),
pp. 113-14.
2.15 Servant-burials in front of the tomb entrance.'
2.16 Sacrificed donkeys, deposited as a whole, normally in pairs,
within the tomb's pit in front of the entrance to the chamber;
in two cases they were buried in separate round pits.s
2. I 7 Toggle pin of bronze on the left shoulder of the burial to hold
together the garment.
2.18 Scarab, either mounted on a copper or silver ring or without
mounting, held in the left hand.
2.19 Golden diadem bands (single or double) around the heads of
both males and females (str. F, D/3).
2.20 Meat-offerings (mainly from sheep and pig), often placed on
plates near the entrance or near the head of the deceased.
2.21 Pottery piled up in heaps beside the skull and juglets, normally
piriform.
2.22 Secondary offerings in shallow separate pits, cut near the
entrance side of the tomb.
3. Settlement Characteristics
Our lack of knowledge about Egyptian settlement features, especially
in the Nile Delta, makes it difficult to isolate settlement characteristics
which are peculiar to the MB-Culture of the Delta. Inevitably the
characteristics to be mentioned will include some which are purely
Egyptian in origin. We also lack, except in str. G, large excavated
residential areas.
3.1 From the evidence at Tell el-Yahudiya we should expect to find
an enclosure with a stucco sloping glacis and possibly a ditch
at other sites of the MB-Culture in the Nile Delta. It is very likely
that most of them have been levelled by agricultural activity.
3.2 Irregular settlement pattern, but with a common orientation
of buildings.
3.3 Compounds consisting of the house, additions, silos, and an
enclosure wall. Round outlines of this wall are typical of str.
F and G; more rectangular outlines appear in str. E/3 and
onwards.
3.4 Compounds of attached houses.
3.5 Rectangular buildings divided into a larger and a smaller room
(snail-house-type). Fireplaces were constructed near the door or
in the centre of the first room. A door in the rear wall gave access
ICf. p. 245 n. 2.
2In Egypt similar evidence was found at Tell Farasha, Tell el-Maskhuta
(Canadian Expedition); in Palestine at Tell el-Ajjul, Lachish and at
Jericho. The sacrificeof a donkey seemsto have been a speciallybinding act
among western Semites (cf. W. H. Stiebing, op. cit., pp. 115-16).
-- --- -

to the second room (str. G and E/3). This kind of house was
usually found in connection with 3.2.
3.6 Houses consisting of several small rooms laid out in the shape
of an L or an U and surrounding a (major) room or a court
(str. G, F).
3.7 Rectangular single buildings with separate inner rooms, covering
a quarter of the ground area.
3.8 Domestic buildings usually with their foundations in pits, not
in trenches. Only sacred buildings normally had foundation
trenches.
4. Corpusof Material Culture
There is a large corpus of types of objects, many of which seem to be
very characteristic for this MB-Culture; the types, however, cannot be
listed here in detail. Bronzes are significant, from a cultural point ofview,
and among them are toggle-pins, daggers, knives, axes, javelin-heads,
and broad belts. At different periods changes in types can be observed.
Very significant also is the pottery, most of which was produced
locally by the Canaanite settlers.' The red-, brown-, or black-polished
ware and the black-polished incised juglets (Tell el-Yahudiya ware)
were only found in tombs or in mortuary temples and, with a single
exception, not in residential areas, apart from some scattered sherds,
which may have been brought to the surface by the destruction of older
tombs. On the other hand, big Egyptian marly-clay vessels (Zirs)
were never found in the tombs, where liquids were generally stored in
Syro-Palestinian amphoras. The domestic pottery consisted mainly of
Egyptian fabrications such as drinking-cups, vases, plates, marly-clay
water-vessels and bottles. Nevertheless, we also found examples of
amphoras and red-polished dipper-juglets and red-polished pots.
Some distinct MB-shapes could also be recognized among the pottery
in the offering pits near the altar in front of the temple, as for example
bowls with a vessel mounted in the centre.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Abbreviations in thefootnotes
AASOR Annual of..the American Schools of Oriental Research (New Haven,
Connecticut); AA Agyptologische Abhandlungen, ed. by Wolfgang Heick and
Eberhard Otto (Wiesbaden); AAT Agypten und Altes Testament (Bamberg);
AfO Archiv fur Orientforschung (BerJin/Graz); AJA American Journal of
Archaeology (N ew York); Aph Anzeiger der philosophisch -historischen Klasse
der Osterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (Vienna); ASAE Annales
du Service des Antiquitcs de l'Egypte (Cairo); AJSL American Journal of
Semitic Languages and Literatures (Chicago); BASOR Bulletin of the
American Schools of Oriental Research (New Haven, Connecticut); BMMA
Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York); BSFE Bulletin
(trimestriel) de la Societe francaise d'Egyptologie (Paris); BSGE Bulletin de
1 According to separate investigations with neutron activation by Mrs Michal
Artzy and Mrs Maureen Kaplan (personal communication).
la Societe de Geographie d'Egypte (Cairo); CAH3 The Cambridge Ancient
History, 3rd edition (Cambridge); Cat. Gen. Catalogue general des antiquites
Egyptiennes du Musee du Caire (Cairo); CdE Chronique d'Egypte
(Brussels); EEF, Mem. Memoir of the Egypt Exploration Fund (London);
Eretz-Israel Annual of the Israel Exploration Society (Jerusalem);
HAB Hildesheimer Agyptologische Beitriige (Hildesheim); IE] Israel
Exploration Journal (Jerusalem); ]EA Journal of Egyptian Archaeology
(EES) (London); ]NES Journal of Near Eastern Studies (Chicago);
LA Lexikon der Agyptologie, ed. by Wolfgang HeIck, Eberhard
Otto and Wolfhart Westendorf (Wiesbaden); MDIK Mitteilungen des
Deutschen Archaologischen Instituts, Abteilung Kairo (Augsburg/Berlin/
Wiesbaden); OIP Oriental Institute Publications (Chicago); O]h
Jahreshefte des Osterreichischen Archaologischen Instituts (Vienna); RdE
Revue d'Egyptologie, ed. by Societe francaise d'Egyptologie (Paris); RB
Revue Biblique (Paris); SAK Studien Altagyptischer Kultur (Hamburg,
Munchen); Sph Sitzungsberichte der Bayrischen Akademie der
Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Abteilung (Munchen); zAs
Zeitschrift fur Agyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde (Leipzig/Berlin).
* ADAM Shehata, 'Report on the Excavations of the Department of

Antiquities at Ezbet Rushdi', ASAE 56 (1959), pp. 207-26.
* BIETAK, M., 'Vorlaufiger Bericht iiber die erste und zweite Kampagne
(dritte Kampagne) der osterreichischen Ausgrabungen auf Tell ed-Daba
im Ostdelta Agyptens' (1966/1967/1968), MDIK 23 (1968), pp. 79-114,
MDIK 26 (1970), pp. 15-41.
* Tell el-Dab'« II, Untersuchungen der Zweigstelle Kairo des
Osterreichischen Archaologischen Institutes, vol. i (Vienna 1975).
* --, 'Hyksos', LA III (Wiesbaden 1978), pp. 93-103.
* --, 'Eine Stele des altesten Konigssohnes des Hyksos Chajan', Labib
Habachi Festschrift, MDIK 37 (1981), pp. 63-71.
* --, 'Ramsesstadt', LA V (Wiesbaden 1983), pp. 128-46.
--, 'Some News about Trade and Trade Warfare in Egypt and the Ancient
Near East', Marhaba 3/1983 (Vienna 1983), pp. 41- 3.
* --, 'Zum Konigreich des '~-zh-R'Nehesi', Festschrift fur W. HeIck, SAK
11 (1984), pp. 59-75. . .
* --, 'Problems of Middle Bronze Age Chronology: New Evidence from
Egypt', A]A 88 (1984), pp. 471-85.
* --,' Eine Palastanlage aus der Zeit des spaten Mittleren Reichs und andere
Forschungsergebnisse all'S dem ostlichen Nildelta (Tell el-Daba
1979-1984)', Aph 121 (1984), pp. 313-49.
* --, 'Tell ed-Daba", LA VI (Wiesbaden 1985), pp. 321-23.
* BOESSNECK, J., Tell ei-Dab'a III, Untersuchungen iii (Vienna 1976).
* -- .. ' and A. VON D~N DRIESCH, Studien an subfossilen Tierknochen aus
Agypten, Miinchner Agyptologische Studien 40 (Miinchen 1981), pp.
136-43.
* VAN DEN BRINK, E.C.M., 'Tombs and Burial Customs in Tell el-Dab'a',
Beitrage zur Agyptologie IV (Vienna 1982).
* GRIFFITH, F.L., 'The Antiquities of Tell el-Yahudiyeh', EEF, Mem. 7
(London 1890), p. 38, pl. 19.
* HABACHI, L., 'Khata'na-Qantir, Importance', ASAE 52 (1954), pp.
443-559.
* --, Tell el-Dab 'a I and Qantir, Untersuchungen der Zweigstelle Kairo des
Osterreichischen Archaologischen Institutes, vol. II (Vienna in
preparation) .
--, The Second Stela of Kamose and his Struggle against the Hyksos Ruler and his
Capital. Abhandlungen des Deutschen Archaologischen Instituts Kairo,
Agyptologischc Reihe 8 (Ghickstadt 1972).
* --, 'Sethos I's Devotion to Seth and Avaris', zis 100 (1974), pp. 95-102.
* HAMZA, M., 'Excavation of the Department of Antiquities at Qantir (Faqus
District)" ASAE 30 (1930), pp. 31-68.
* HAYES, W. C., Glazed Tiles from a Palace of Ramesses II at Kantir (New York
1937).
* NAVILLE, E., The Shrine of Saft el-Henneh and the Land of Goshen (1885)
(London 1887), pp. 21-3.
PORADA, E., 'The Cylinder Seal from Tell el-Dab'a', AJA 88 (1984), pp.
485-8.
* PUSCH, E.B., Qantir-Piramesse-Nord, Berichte und Beitrage zu der Grabung des
Pelizaeus-Museums an der Ramses-Stadt, AAT 10 (in press).
* VAN SETERS, J., The Hyksos, a New Investigation (Yale Univ. Press. New
Haven and London 1966).
* UPHILL, E.P., The Temples of Pi Ramesse (Warminster 1984).
POSTSCRIPT
From 1979, when I gave my lecture to the British Academy, until 1984
excavations were continued on another part of the site, in the agricultural area
c. 400 m west of Tell el Daba (area F), revealing a partly earlier range of
stratigraphy of the utmost importance! which will be summarized below.
Concerning the absolute chronology, the dates already suggested? have been
confirmed by a seriation study", with the higher of the two proposed
chronologies gaining preference. The lower chronology would, however, be
in keeping with the new ultra low chronology of Rolf Krauss." While
continuing investigations on the main tell (A), it became evident that a minor
correction in the stratigraphy of the area had become necessary. The bulk of
stratum A is of the Late Period (str. A/2) and Third Intermediate Period (str.
A/3) while the remains of the Ptolemaic Period are only scanty (str. All).
In what follows the stratigraphy of the new site F is shown in relation to
the old site A. The synchronisms between both sites are based on ceramic
seriation together with other features such as burial customs and architectural
traits.
Area F characteristics corresponding

strata of area A 5
Str. all: Surface denuded, tombs of Ptolemaic All
Period, probably also plundered tombs of
Late Period, A/2
scattered slipper coffin fragments, late
New Kingdom (c. 1200 BC) B
Str. a/2: Surface denuded, tombs and waste pits D/2-E/l
of Second Intermediate Period,
foundations of mud-brick temple with
offering pits, MB II B3 (after ± 1650 El
BC)
Str. b/l: Enlargement of the villas of str. b/2-3, E/2-3
chamber-tombs in houses or courtyards,
MB II B 2-3 and Egyptian influence
(±1670-1650 BC)
! M. Bietak, Aph 121 (1984), pp. 312-349.

2 See above, pp. 236-7.
3 M. Bietak, AJA 88 (1984), pp. 471-485; id., in Festschrift Hermann Vetters (Vienna
1985), pp. 5-9.
4 R. Krauss, Das Ende der Amarnazeit, RAB 7 (Hildesheim 1978), pp. 189-93; and
Giittinger Miszellen 50 (1981), pp. 71-80,70 (1984), p. 38; see also E Hornung, in Edel
Festschrift, AAT 1 (Bamberg 1979), pp. 247-52.
5 See above, pp. 236-7.
--
Area F characteristics corresponding
strata of area A
Str. b/2-3: More compact settlement, villas and F -E/3

smaller houses, tombs in houses or in
courtyards, MB II A/B and MB II B/1
and Egyptian influence (±1710-1670
BC)
Str. C/l-2: Loose settlement, small square houses G
with two rooms, identical with buildings
of str. G at site A, 1 tombs in houses or
courtyards, late MB II A and Egyptian
MK culture (± 1740-1710 BC)
short hiatus (?)
Str. d/l: Palace of Egyptian type, material H ?
remains of Egyptian culture and MB II
A(± 1760-1750BC)
Str. d/2: Loose settlement, "Mittelsaalhaus", MB
II A mixed with Egyptian cultural traits,
closed family cemetery within settlement
(± 1800-1760 BC)
hiatus
Str. e: Planned orthogonal settlement, Egyptian
culture of late First Intermediate Period
(± 2050-2000 BC)
Stratum e
The earliest stratum of the new site is an orthogonal planned settlement
surrounded by a thick enclosure wall. It dates from the late First Intermediate
Period and can most probably be identified as lfwt-R,'w,'ty-!:f.ty "the estate'
Rowaty of (King) Kheti ", mentioned on a stela of the temple of Ammenemes
III at Ezbet Rushdi." This kind of settlement may be identified as one of the
new foundations proposed in the teachings for Merikare" in order to check
Asiatic infiltration." It seems that afterwards in the time of the 12th dynasty,
the settlement was moved to the area north of the lake and of the original
settlement, between the villages of Ezbet Rushdi and Ezbet Helmy.
Stratum d/2
Later, in about 1800 BC, new settlers, carriers of the Syro-Palestinian
Middle Bronze Age Culture, but under advanced Egyptian influence, moved
in and occupied the area south of the lake, covering the abandoned First
Intermediate Period site. Among their ar9hitectural features a Syrian
1 See above, pp. 238-9 and pIs. IV, V. 'r ',-

2 For the original meaning of luot as foundation of the king see M. Atzler, CdE 47
(1972), pp, 17-44.
3 See above, pp, 228-9, there still translated as "temple of Kheti". The discovery of
the rectangular settlement changed our understanding of this toponym (see previous
note).
4 See above, p. 228, n . 7.
"Mittelsaalhaus" is of special importance.' This kind of building was
unknown in Palestine; it was directly imported from coastal Syria by the
newcomers who originally may have been sailors, shipbuilders and miltiary
craftsmen in Egyptian service." They became more and more independent
during the time of the 13th dynasty.
Stratum d/J
Our most interesting discovery in the past five years was probably a palace,
which we uncovered in an area of about 80 x 60 m., but is still not completely
excavated. It consisted of a villa-like structure similar to the central rooms of
the Kahun house" with a central four columned hall (M) between a sleeping-
room with a niche (S), another hall in the west and a dressing-room in the
south (A). In front of this group of rooms lay a court surrounded by galleries.
The southern gallery had originally been an open entrance hall. Later, it was
TELL EL DAB'A
GRASUNGSFLACHE FIJ PALASTBEZIRK STRATUM d!1
1D. Eigner, in M. Bietak, Aph 121 (1984), Abb. 3 and forthcoming.

2 M. Bietak, Tell el-Dab'a V, chapter I (in preparation).
3 Cf. H. Ricke, Der Grundri(3 des Amarna- Wohnhauses, Ausgrabungen der DOG in Tell el-
Amarna IV (Leipzig 1932), pp. 52-5.
-
closed by a symmetrically arranged entrance building on the north and
another open entrance hall furnished with columns (E). Later this building
was closed and another approach was constructed with a hall opening from
the east. South of this approach we found another central palace group and
remains of flower beds on its northern side.
South of the whole palace two strata indicating a park (G) were discovered
with irrigation channels, tree-pits and flower beds. They seem to enclose a
regular cemetery (F), most likely belonging to the family of the owner of the
palace. The cemetery, still awaiting excavation, is most probably heavily
looted.
A similar situation of a palace together with a cemetery of mayors at
Bubastis! suggests, that the building at Tell el Dab 'a was probably also the
residence of the mayors of the town. The abrupt end of the final building
phase probably reflects a similar situation at Bubastis where the palace was
abandoned and looted and the local dynasty of mayors came to an end
approximately at the time of the establishment of the reign of King ','-zlJ--R'
Nehesi. He and his father founded at Avaris one of the first local kingdoms
in the Delta, independent of the 13th dynasty, in about 1730-1720 BC.2
Another possibility would be that the palace of Tell el Dab 'a belonged to
Nehesi and his dynasty; however, its date would be too late for our present
understanding of the chronological setting of the palace.
A third explanation for the building under consideration would be a kind
of summer residence of one of the short lived kings of Asiatic origin during
the 13th dynasty whose family probably came from the area of Tell el Daba,
a stronghold of Canaanites in Egypt during that period." It is, in this
. connection, interesting to mention a cylinder seal, with a representation of the
north Syrian weather god, which was found in another-still unexcavated
pavilion of the palace."
Stratum c and b
On the ruins of the palace, again, people of Asiatic origin continued to
settle. First in more humble buildings and huts. Soon afterwards a differ-
entiation in the architectural remains can be observed. Besides villas,
repeating the scheme of the palace nucleus, humble buildings, most probably
of subordinates, can be observed. The dead were interred within houses or,
more frequently, within small cemeteries in the domestic courtyards. As in
stratum F on the tell A for a short period servants were buried in front of the
tomb entrances.
The material culture of this community was a mixed Syro-Palestinian
Middle Bronze Age and Egyptian Middle Kingdom culture. The dress was,
at least partly, Asiatic in style, as togglepins, found at the left shoulder of the
burials, show. The economic background at that time was trade with Syria,
1 Ch. C. Van Siclen III, 'The Mayors of Basta in the Middle Kingdom', Abstracts of
Papers, Fourth International Congress of Egyptology (Munich 1985), pp. 224-5, and
personal communication.
2 J. von Beckerath, Untersuchungenzur politischen Geschichteder Zweiten Zwischenzeit in
Agypten (Gluckstadt 1964), pp. 81-5; M. Bietak, in Festschrift fiir W Helck, SAK 11
(1984), pp. 59-75.
3 Cf. M. Bietak, Aph 121 (1984), p. 332.
4 E. Porada, AJA 88 (1984), pp. 485-8.
Upper Egypt and probably Nubia as can be deduced from the distribution of
the types of the early Tell el Yahudiya ware! and the import of Canaanite
amphorae as containers of olive oil and probably of wine." Another
important factor in the economy was the copper industry, which brought
about the introduction of advanced casting techniques from the region of
Byblos to Egypt. Between the strata c and b (before about ± 1700 BC)
numerous burials in shallow pits without funerary equipment, sometimes two
or three persons together, suggest a severe epidemic. On tell A, where such
graves were also observed, a drastic reduction of the settling activity can be
found immediately afterwards." Probably we may identify this disease with
the plague, known in medical papyri of the New Kingdom as the "Asiatic
disease" .4
Stratum a/2
Apart from the foundations of a temple of the Hyksos period, this stratum
is represented only in pits such as tombs or offering-pits in front of a shrine.
The upper continuation of the stratigraphy at this site has been levelled away
already by agriculture, showing that all effort should be made to increase
archaeological activity in the Delta.
New Kingdom remains on tell A
In 1985 excavations were resumed at the site of the probable Sutekh
ternple.! revealing within the enclosure walls remains of gardens with pits
for trees and bushes. Later this area was thickly covered by Late Period
domestic architecture (str. A/2).
Ramesside remains in Qantir
In 1981 the Pelizaeus Museum of Hildesheim/West Germany started, in
close cooperation with the Austrian Institute, excavations with important new
results in the northern part of the concession at the area south of the cemetery
of Qantir." There, remains of a huge building complex, with a spacious
court lined with galleries two columns deep, were found. According to the
finds this complex could be identified as barracks for charioteers. South of it
was situated a major compound for military workshops. E. Pusch was able
to identify even weaponry of Hittite typology suggesting close links between
Egypt and Kheta after the marriage of a Hittite princess to Ramesses II.
Scattered animal remains from lions, leopards, elephants, and other exotic
beasts suggest the existence of a royal menagerie nearby. 7
1 M. Bietak, 'Tell el-fohudija-Keramik", LA VI, pp. 335-48, and forthcoming. On

this ware, in general, see M. Kaplan, The Origin and Distribution oj Tell el Yahudiyeh Ware
(Goteborg 1980).
2 A special study on the MB Canaanite amphora and its distribution is presently
carried out by Joan Huntoon (Columbia Univ. NY.), aided by neutron activation
analysis. The stratigraphy of Tell el-Dab'a will provide part of chronological
framework.
3 See above p. 241.
4 H. Goedicke, 'Seuche', LA V: pp. 918-9; iol., SAK 11 (1984) pp. 91-105.

5 See above pp. 268-71 Kanol M. Bietak, Aph 122 (1985), pp. 267 ff.
6 The project director is A. Eggebrecht, field director E. B. Pusch. For

preliminary reports see selected bibliography under Pusch.
7 See selected bibliography under Boessneck.
--
All these new results will contribute substantially to the reconstruction of
the topography and of historical events in the eastern Delta.
The author wishes to thank the following, who are responsible for the
photographs which appear in this lecture: Ingrid Asmus (A),
Kunsthistorisches Museum (K), Wilfred Seipel (S), Michael Wrobel (W).
Where unstated copyright is held by the author.
'"d
r-
I. View of the southern part of the area taken from a water tower, looking south-east. In the foreground Ezbet Rushdi, behind remains of the old lake.
~
trl
Tell el-Dab'a with the village on top in the background (S) ~
PLATE II
IIa. Lintel of an administrative building of the

12th dynasty (Sesostris III) at Tell el-Qirqafa
(S).
lIb. Jamb fragment of a private house of a high
Ramesside official during the reign of Meren-
ptah, found at Qantir
PLATE III
IlIa. Octagonal limestone columns which appeared by agricultural levelling of debris

and the substructure (behind) of a palace of the 19th dynasty at Qantir South, Tell
el-Asfar (W)
Illb. Limestone column with the names of Ramesses II at Tell Abu el-Shafei in Qantir
North (S)
I1Ie. Base of a colossal statue, excavated by Shehata Adam 1954, behind the levelled
area of Tell Abu el-Shafei (S)
,
'i:l
r-
;J>
~
trl
H
<
IV. Tell el-Dab'a, stratum G,

building compound of the late I
13th dynasty inhabited by
Canaanites. Main building
with two rooms and a tomb
in front of the entrance. Two
subsequently attached rooms
with numerous amphoras
""r-
~
trl
V. Two other double room buildings (A(II-o(I6-17), resembling the hieroglyph ILl (ofstr. G, late MK)
<:
PLATE VI
VI. Grave (A/II-n/I2, no. 4) of Egyptian type within a building compound of str. G
with limestone coffin, late MK
PLATE VII
VII. Large jug with incised design from a building of str, G (h. ± 32 em, reg. 1734,
Kunsthist. Mus. Vienna no. A 1691) (K)
PLATE VIII
, , , 1 ••• , •••• n u " •• i •• a a "" •.• "."" ?''' '" I.

IlIftllUllIllIlIlIlIlIIlIlIlIlIllIIllllllllllllllllllllllllin 11111111111 ,
VIlla. Fish offering bowl of marly clay, Upper Egyptian production, from
compound pl. IV (W)
VlIIh. Canaanite tombs ofstr. F (m/I6, nos. 2-4) cutting into a charcoal layer
PLATE IX
IX. Mudbrick chamber tomb with a female burial after removal of the vault. Above her
head plate with bone remains of an offered roasted mutton piece (W)
PLATE X
X. Burials of two warriors with bronze dagger and battle axe each, str. F, and further
offerings; above AjIl-I/I2, tomb 5
>-0
r-
~
~
XI. View into a tomb chamber of mud brick, str. F, containing two female burials with offerings, ca. 60 em. under subsoil (W)
-
~
~
171
:x:
~
~
XII. Detail of previous with kohl-pot of haematite for eye-paint, copper mirror, and Syro-palestinian pottery
PLATE XIII
XIII. Double necklace of gold, carnelian, and glaze from the same tomb, Egyptian work-
manship of the time of the Middle Kingdom (W)
PLATE XIV
XIV. Servant burial laid across the entrance of a chamber tomb of str. F, constructed of
mud brick (W)
PLATE XV
XVa. Burial of a pair of donkeys with a drinking cup as offering, str. G or F (W)
XVb. A Canaanite main temple (no. III), looking north, str. F and E/g. Sanctuary
niche in foreground (10 m squares)
PLATE XVI
XVIa. Canaanite main temple (no. III), str. F and E/3, looking east. The building
remains were damaged by deep sebakh pits
XVIb. Front wall of this temple with three entrances looking west. Stone slab in front
of the temple in the background
PLATE XVII
XVIIa. Remains of Canaanite temple V, next to temple III, looking south. Filling wall
in foreground
XVIIh. Mortuary temple (no. II), north of the main temple III, limiting the sacred
precinct in the west. Str. E/3, looking north
PLATE XVIII
XVIIla. Limestone fragment with name of King Nehesy (I4th dynasty), one of the first
kings known to have resided at Avaris (± 1720 Be) (A)
XVlIIh. Red polished pottery krater with dipper cup still inside. From floor of the 'priest-
house', str. E/3-2
PLATE XIX
-_____
---
--
-
sa
--
-
--
-
-..
-
--
-
---
-
--
XIX. Pottery from the offering pits near the altar, In front of the temple (A)
xx ar.vra
PLATE XXI
XXIa. Mortuary temple I, str. Ej2, during excavation, looking north-east
XXIb. The same after restoration, looking south

PLATE XXII
XXIIa. Tomb robbers-pit, cutting through a tomb vault soon after the construction,
str. E/2
XXIIb. A/II-I/I2-tomb 2, str. Ell. Male burial with heaps of juglets near his head.
Beside the femur shadows of a reed bundle, used for wrapping up the body
PLATE XXIII
XXIII. Sandbrick chamber of tomb A/II-N/lg-no. 8 after removal of vault, str. E/g
PLATE XXIV
XXIV. Intact tomb of str. D/3 before opening. Mudbrick construction

PLATE XXV
XXV. The same after removal of vault. See also the outer offerings within the pit, which is
more spacious in front of the entrance
PLATE XXVI
-
-
-
-
-
-,
---
,
-
-
-
-
-
=
=
a
51
~
-
.-
~
-.-
--
~
-
=.
-
a
- '.,"
c
d
XXVla, b. MB II A shaped jugs, red polished, from strata G and F
XXVlc, d. Red polishedjuglets (reg. 2512 and 301) from tombs ofstr. F and E/3 (K)
PLATE XXVII
,~-~ -
,
1782 I "
s:
§,,' ,
,
,
a b
~~'" """'J.. ~ __ """~
183~
c d
XXVII a-d. Black polished incised juglets from tombs of strata F and E/3
PLATE XXVIII
XXVIII. Juglet (reg. 1675) of tomb 1/14, no. 7, str. E/3 (K)
PLATE XXIX
XXIX. Black polished incised juglet (reg. 884) from mill,

tomb 7, str. Ell (K)
PLATE XXX
---
.=§
~
..
-= ~
~
b
a
c d
XXXa-d. Black polished incised juglets, str. Ell and DI3 (K and A)
PLATE XXXI
2701
b
c d
XXXla-d Red polishedjuglets ofstr. G (reg. 2664), D/3 (reg. 2701), Ell (reg. 209. 1408)
PLATE XXXII
XXXIIa-c. Red polished bowls of str. E/2, Ell and Ell, the second one
incised by an rankh sign (K)
PLATE XXXIII
XXXIIla. Cypriote white painted V-bowl from a child's tomb

(mill, no. I), str. D/2
XXXIIlh. Cypriote jug of the white pendent line ware, str. Ell (K)
PLATE XXXIV
XXXIVa. Ivory comb from tomb, str. F, (A/II-j/lI,

no. 2), reg. 566 (K)
to""
.
XXXIVb.- Various scarabs from Tell el-Dab'a

PLATE XXXV
XXXVa. Head of a Middle Kingdom private statue, used as grinding-stone during the
. Hyksos Period, str. D/3 (K)
XXXVb. Fragment of a cultic plate of bronze with an image of King Neferhotep of the
late 13th dynasty, intentionally destroyed by series of nail imprints and hammer blows,
str. D/3 (K)
""C
r-
~
tri
X
X
~
~
' ,.
~
I
b
a
XXXVla. Toggle pins from graves of the Second Intermediate Period (K)
XXXVlh. Bronze weapons from strata F to D/3 (K)
PLATE XXXVII
1
.1
XXXVIIa. Crocodile figurine of clay, found near the shore of the ancient lake, reg. 563,
Ramesside? (K)
XXXVIIh. Settlement of late Second Intermediate Period, looking west, str. D/2
(A/II-n/13, 12) with tomb chambers constructed within the building
PLATE XXXVIII
XXXVlIIa. Lintel fragment of a sanctuary for God Seth with the royal names of
Haremhab, str. B
XXXVIIlb. Blue painted pottery (reg. 1600) from

the temple complex of str. B (end of r Sth and early
rqth dynasty) (K)
'One excavation which is of special interest not only to Egyptologists but

also to biblical scholars and Palestinian archaeologists is being conducted in
the north-eastern delta by an Austrian expedition under the direction of
Dr. Manfred Bietak. For more than a century Egyptologists have been
trying to identify the location of the city of Ramses, which the Book of
Exodus tells us the children of Israel were required to build for Pharaoh.
No fewer than five places have been identified with it at different times in
the past, the most strongly favoured being Tanis, called Zoan in the Old
Testament. Ramses would then merely be another name for Tanis, called
Djane in the Egyptian texts.
'It has long been accepted that Ramses, or Pi-Ramses as it was called by
the Egyptians, stood on or near the site of Avaris, the capital of Egypt under
the Asiatic invaders, known as the H yksos, who ruled over most of the country
in the sixteenth to seventeenth centuries B.C. The problem therefore was to
find somewhere in the eastern delta which had, on the one hand, evidence
of having been occupied by Asiatics and, on the other, Ramesside remains
which could be reconciled with ancient descriptions of Pi-Ramses. Tanis
satisfied these requirements, at least to the extent that monuments of the
two periods were found there, but they had always been reused and they
were not in their original positions.
'What seems to be a final solution to the problem is now emerging from
the Austrian excavations at Tell el-Dab'a, Among the many remains of
the occupation of the site by Asiatic people were two Canaanite temples, a
temple of the Egyptian god Sutekh who was adopted by the Hyksos, human
burials displaying foreign customs, such as the interment of a pair of donkeys
at the entrance to the tombs, and pottery and bronze objects resembling
Syro-Palestinian products of the same period .... '
I. E. S. EDW ARDS, The Times

ISBN 0 8672 201 4
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Kition: Mycenaean and Phoenician. v. KARAGEORGHIS
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932

Reprinted with a revised Postscript and

FROM THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE

I© The British Academy 1981

Reprinted with a revised Postscript and

Hobbs the Printers oj Southampton (3372)

Read 9 May 1979

M ANY events important in the history of Egypt took place

II Tell el-Dab'a, its environment and previous investigations

1975), p. 80, figs. 8,9, pI. IV. .

EEF Mem. 7 (London 1890), pp. 56, 57, pI. XIX.

turtlebacks TELL EL 1lA&~- Q.I/lTIR

FIG. 1. The Position of Tell el-Dab'a and Qantir in relation

North of the mound there is a natural lake basin, which at

Ak. d. Wiss., Sph. 136/8 (Munich 1936), pp. 39-45'

3 M. Hamza, ASAE 30 (1930), p. 20.

I L. Habachi, ASAE 52 (1954), pp. 479-544; Habachi also showed

5 w. C. Hayes, op. cit., and The Scepter of Egypt II (Cambridge, Mass.

See also A. H. Gardiner, ]EA 19 (1933), pp. 122-8.

I II Excavations at Tell el-Dab'a 1966-1978

I J. von Beckerath, op. cit., pp. 218-24; W. HeIck, Die Beziehungen

Since this alabaster jar of Sebeknakht from Tumulus III and

1972), p. 108. 3 O. Tufnell, Levant 2 (1970), pp. 95-9.

4 J. Garstang, El Arabah (London 1901), p. 10, with the Hyksos name

4/115. 8 J. M. Weinstein. loco cit.

238 PROCEEDINGS OF THE BRITISH ACADEMY

FIG. 2. Tell el-Dab'a, stratum G, late Middle Kingdom settlement

J.E. COBB LIBRARY

FIG 3. Large Tell el-Yahudiyajug from str. G with incised decoration

In other complexes, however, the graves were more richly

it shows that Egyptian or Egyptianized and Canaanite popula-

include a diadem consisting of an electrum band to which

FIG. 6A. Offerings from tomb m/lo no. 8, str. F or E/3

The housing installations on the other hand looked rather

.' ~.,/:, I rf)) I~':" .~;. I

FIG. 6B. Offerings from tomb mllo no. 8, str. F or E/3

All!. mIlS GRAB 8 STRATUM F

Fro. 7. Offerings from tomb mIlS no. 8, str. F

chamber's entrance and, above the animals, two human

4 I.e. pits, excavated in order to gain material for brick production or as

FIG. 8. Tell el-Dab'a, sacred precinct, str. E/3-2

building, which is now being excavated. Most probably it was

ATCH.\NA.lEMPlE SlII. VlI

1lAZOR. AREA "

ATCH.INA. TEMPlE SlR.1Y r-foor=Io! -!'!==."""' ----il.

In front of the temple is a large area, bounded on the west

charred bones, mainly of cattle and a few of sheep, but not a

I H. Frankfort, Iraq Excavations 1932-33, Oriental Institute Communica-

well attested at Piramesse; cf. R. Stadelmann, Syrisch-paldstinensiche Gottheiten

'lEU. e. D6B'A sn:t. Ef2-t

The pro-cella shows again a division into three elements, an

of mud-brick and a separate chamber for meat-offerings.

Within the cemetery some sub-grouping may be discerned in

FIG. 13. Offerings from tomb mlII no. 7, str. Ell

f,B ~ V'.o cj0

FIG. 14. Offerings from tomb 1/12 no. I, str. E/I-D/3

types seem to be typical of the MB II B (3) Culture of the

already show a stronger Egyptian influence. Beside the two

FIG. 16. Tomb m/15 no. 3, str. D/3