03. The Animals of Egypt and the Pentateuch.

The Animals of Egypt and the Pentateuch. The author, remarks v. Bohlen further in the passage referred to, supposes the existence of camels and asses in Egypt. The allegation, as fully stated by him with his reasons,^[11] is as follows: “The narrator mentions the animals of his own native land, a part of which Abraham could not receive in Egypt. Genesis 45:23; Genesis 47:17, Exodus 9:3. He ascribes to him no horses which were native to Egypt, as the relator indeed is aware, Genesis 41:43; Genesis 47:17; but, on the other hand, he mentions sheep, which are found in the marsh lands of Egypt as seldom as camels (hence these last are denied to the country by the ancient writers) and asses, which were specially odious to the Egyptians on account of their color.”

[11] S. 163, uponGenesis 12:16.

It is said in the passage designated: “And he [Pharaoh] entreated Abraham well for her sake; and he had sheep, and oxen, and he-asses, and men servants, and maid servants, and she-asses, and camels.”

We inquire, first, why the horse is not also among the presents. Even v. Bohlen dares not assert that this circumstance is accounted for, by supposing that the author did not know how abundant horses were in Egypt. In the enumeration of the animals of the Egyptians, in Genesis 47:17, horses stand first, also in Exodus 9:3. The rearing of horses is considered in the Pentateuch as so peculiar to Egypt, that in Deuteronomy 17:16, it is represented as possible, that an Israelitish king, merely from love to the horse, might wish to lead back the people to Egypt. If now the reason why horses are not mentioned cannot be found on the part of the giver, it must be found with the receiver. It appears that horses were not yet in use among the Israelites, either in peace or war, at the time of Joshua and the Judges^[12]. They were first commonly used in the time of the kings. But if the horse was not yet used by the Israelites, at the time of Joshua and the Judges, much less was it surely in the age of the Pentateuch, when the main object, which the keeping of horses subserved in Palestine, did not exist.^[13] If now this is the reason why the horse does not appear in the enumeration of the presents, it is entirely in favor of the true historical character and Mosaic origin of the narration. If it owed its origin to the poetic tradition of the time of the kings, horses would certainly have been mentioned, since we cannot suppose that the time of the introduction of them was accurately known, and still less that the fiction was so carefully managed for the sake of maintaining historical consistency. But we need not stop with merely the present passage. The Pentateuch in other places continually implies that in the ancient times with which it is concerned, there were no horses among the patriarchs and their descendants. “Moses,” says Michaelis, “repeatedly describes to us the riches of the Patriarchs, as consisting of their herds, among which, while oxen, sheep, goats, camels and asses are enumerated, we never once find horses mentioned.”^[14] The tabernacle was drawn by oxen in the desert. Numbers 7:3. That a great number of horses could not be conveniently kept in Palestine, is implied in Deuteronomy 17:16. These facts, according to modern views respecting the Pentateuch, are entirely inexplicable. They compel us at least to the assumption, that the composition of the narration precedes the time of the commencement of the kingdom, while at the same time the attempts to refer the substance of the history in the books of Joshua and Judges to later times, have also a formidable obstacle in the apparently trivial circumstance, that in them the horse is not represented as in use. Let it be borne in mind here, that we find nowhere a historical notice of the time of the introduction of horses, that they were in all probability introduced gradually, and that the Israelites did not probably know that which a scholar of the last century, by a laborious comparison of many scattered passages, has made entirely certain.

[12]See J. D. Michaelis, Mosaic Laws. Eng. Trans. Vol. II. p. 434.

[13] From the monuments we learn that horses were used chiefly in war, especially for drawing chariots, in which the most distinguished Egyptian warriors rode to battle. Solomon was the first ruler of the Hebrews who formed an efficient corps of cavalry, and he obtained most of his horses from Egypt. As Abraham was a peaceful patriarch, who avoided war even under circumstances of great provocation, a gift of animals rarely used at the period would have been every way unsuitable. The omission of the horse then, instead of being an objection, is one of the strongest possible of undesigned confirmations of the truth of the narrative.

[14]Mich. Mos. Laws. Eng. Trans. Vol. II. p. 436. CompareGenesis 20:14;Genesis 24:35;Genesis 26:14;Genesis 30:41;Genesis 32:6;Genesis 32:8;Genesis 32:15-16.

It has occurred to no one before v. Bohlen to deny, that there were asses in Egypt. All of the authors who speak of the hatred of the Egyptians to this animal, imply that it existed there.^[15] How, also, could they otherwise have been sacrificed to Typhon. Swine too were considered unclean in Egypt, yet they were kept.^[16] He and she-asses appear in great numbers on the monuments. The former were commonly used for riding—we find them represented with rich trappings,—the latter as beasts of burden.^[17] A single individual is represented on the monuments, as having 760 of them, which makes it evident that they were very numerous.^[18] [15] Compare the passage in Schmidt, de sacerd. et sacrif. Aeg. p. 283.

[16] Herod. 2. 47, 48. Schmidt, p. 269.

[17] Taylor, pp. 6, 7.This distinction is noticed in the account of the presents sent by Joseph to Jacob, when he invited the patriarch to Egypt: “And to his father he sent after this manner ; ten asses laden with the good things of Egypt, and ten she-asses laden with corn and bread and meat for his father by the way,”Genesis 45:23.

[18]Wilkinson, Vol. III. p. 34. The assertion that sheep^[19] were not found in Egypt, every modern manual of Geography confutes. Ukert^[20] says, “Sheep are found in great numbers in Egypt. Their wool is an important article of trade, and their flesh is the most common which comes upon the table.”^[21] If Ancient authors often mention the sheep of Egypt. According to Herodotus,^[22] rams were considered sacred by the Thebans, and sheep were sacrificed by the inhabitants of the Mendesian nome^[23] in the Delta. Plutarch says, the Lycopolites ate the flesh of sheep, and according to Diodorus^[24], the sheep produced their young twice in a year and were twice shorn. Sheep appear on the monuments often and in great numbers. Large herds of them were kept especially in the neighborhood of Memphis. Sometimes the flocks consisted of more than two thousand.^[25]

^[19] Wilkinson, in his “Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians,” second series, Vol. I. pp. 130, 131, &c. gives the representation of a scene from a tomb hewn in the rock near the pyramids of Geezeh, which is of special interest as illustrating several points in Egyptian antiquity. The tomb bears the name of the king Suphis or Cheops, which shows it, at least, to be the work of an age before the 18th dynasty, and’ in all probability it was made about 2090 or 2050 B. C, more than a century before the arrival of Abraham in Egypt. The head shepherd presents himself to give an account of the Hocks committed to his- charge which follow after him. “First come the oxen, over which is the number 834, cows 220, goats 3234, asses 760, and sheep 974. Behind follows a man carrying the young lambs in baskets slung upon a pole. The steward, leaning on his staff and accompanied by his dog, stands on the left of the picture; and in another part of the tomb, the scribes are represented making out the statements presented to them by the different persons employed on the estate." The bearing of this painting upon several subsequent parts of this volume should not be unnoticed; compare especially pp. 25, 87.

[20]Nordhälfte von Afrika, S. 169.

[21] Compare, on rearing sheep in Egypt, Girard in the Description, t. 17. p. 129 seq.

[22] 2. 41 and 2. 42.

[23] Nome, province, from the Greekνόμος, is the name given to each of the 36 parts into which Sesostris divided Egypt.

[24]1. 36 and 87.

[25] See Wilk. Vol. II. p. 368. Champollion, Briefe, S. 51, according to whom the treading down of the ground by rams is represented in the grottoes of Beni Hassan, 53. That the camel existed in ancient Egypt is indeed probable from the analogy of the present time.^[26] It is acknowledged that they have not yet been found delineated on the monuments,^[27] except those scattered traces which Minutoli^[28] thinks that he discovered on the obelisks of Luxor. But this circumstance, at most, only proves that camels were not very abundant in Egypt, and even that not with entire certainty.^[29] The Pentateuch itself also intimates the same thing, since in the passage under consideration, camels are mentioned last, and in Genesis 45:23, not at all. A multitude of objects which can be demonstrated to have existed among the ancient Egyptians are wanting in their paintings. In the numerous hunting scenes, for example, the wild boar is not seen, although it is a native of Egypt. The wild ass, which is common in the deserts of Thebaid’s also not met with.^[30] Even fowls and pigeons, which Egypt had in so great abundance, do not appear, while “geese are repeatedly introduced.”^[31] Of other objects which, although they certainly existed, are not found upon the monuments, the same author speaks on page 254, Vol. III, with which compare too what is said on page 344 of the same Vol. concerning the great deficiency of the monuments.

[26]Ukert, S. 169. Giard in the Description, t. 17. p. 128, says: “The camels which are used in Said for the transportation of all kinds of freight, unless it is sent by water upon the Nile or upon the canals, are inferior in size and strength to those in Lower Egypt. The raising of these animals is one of the chief employments of the Arabs who dwell upon the borders of the valley of Egypt. They furnish the markets of different provinces with them. The camels which are used for the transportation of the harvest do not always belong to the husbandman. He hires them as he needs them. During the remainder of the year, he makes use of the ass. There is no land-owner who does not possess several asses,” etc. According to t. 15, p. 215 of the Descr. the camels of the Delta are less valued than those of the provinces which border upon the desert.

[27] Wilk. I. p. 351.

[28] Reise, S. 293. Minutoli, Henry, Baron Menu Von, born at Geneva, of a Savoyard family, in 1772, is best known by his antiquarian researches in Egypt. He went to that country in 1820, and returned in 1822. A part of his collection of antiquities was lost by a shipwreck. The remainder, purchased by the king of Prussia for about 15000 fr., were deposited in the new museum at Berlin. His most distinguished work is the “Journey to the Temple of Jupiter Ammon in the desert of Lybia,” Berlin, 1824. He published “Additions to his Journey,” &c. in 1827.

[29] The absence of any particular animal from the monuments, is by no means a proof that it was unknown in the country ; especially when we have decisive evidence of the converse of the case—the appearance of an animal on the monuments, not mentioned by any ancient writer in connection with Egypt. I allude to the giraffe or camolopard, which appears more than once among the articles of tribute brought down from southern Africa to the Pharaohs. It is no difficult matter to account for the omission of camels on the monuments: the great object of Egyptian policy, so long as the country was subject to native princes, was to train a settled agricultural people; but the camel, or “ship of the desert,” as it is poetically named by the Bedouins, was, as it still continues to be, peculiarly the animal of nomade life. Even at the present day, camels are chiefly bred by the Arabs on the borders of Egypt, and are only hired by the agriculturists for transport as they are needed. 

[30]Wilk. III. p. 21.

[31] Wilk. p. 35. In an Egyptian fresco preserved in the British museum, representing a garden and pleasure-ground, geese and ducks are depicted swimming in the ponds.