Meruserre Yaqub-Har (other spelling: Yakubher, also known as Yak-Baal) was a
pharaoh
Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian: ''pr ꜥꜣ''; cop, , Pǝrro; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') is the vernacular term often used by modern authors for the kings of ancient Egypt who ruled as monarchs from the First Dynasty (c. 3150 BC) until the an ...
of
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...
during the 17th or 16th century BCE. As he reigned during Egypt's fragmented
Second Intermediate Period
The Second Intermediate Period marks a period when ancient Egypt fell into disarray for a second time, between the end of the Middle Kingdom and the start of the New Kingdom. The concept of a "Second Intermediate Period" was coined in 1942 by ...
, it is difficult to date his reign precisely, and even the dynasty to which he belonged is uncertain.
Chronological position
The dynasty to which Yaqub-Har belongs is debated, with Yaqub-Har being seen variously as a 14th Dynasty king, an early
Hyksos
Hyksos (; Egyptian '' ḥqꜣ(w)- ḫꜣswt'', Egyptological pronunciation: ''hekau khasut'', "ruler(s) of foreign lands") is a term which, in modern Egyptology, designates the kings of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt (fl. c. 1650–1550 BC).
T ...
ruler of the 15th Dynasty or a vassal of the Hyksos kings. Yaqub-Har is attested by no less than 27 scarab seals. Three are from
Canaan
Canaan (; Phoenician: 𐤊𐤍𐤏𐤍 – ; he, כְּנַעַן – , in pausa – ; grc-bib, Χανααν – ;The current scholarly edition of the Greek Old Testament spells the word without any accents, cf. Septuaginta : id est Vetus T ...
, four from Egypt, one from
Nubia
Nubia () (Nobiin: Nobīn, ) is a region along the Nile river encompassing the area between the first cataract of the Nile (just south of Aswan in southern Egypt) and the confluence of the Blue and White Niles (in Khartoum in central Sudan), or ...
and the remaining 19 are of unknown provenance.
[Darrell D. Baker: ''The Encyclopedia of the Pharaohs: Volume I - Predynastic to the Twentieth Dynasty 3300–1069 BC'', Stacey International, , 2008, p. 503-504] The wide geographic repartition of these scarabs indicate the existence of trade relations among the
Nile Delta
The Nile Delta ( ar, دلتا النيل, or simply , is the delta formed in Lower Egypt where the Nile River spreads out and drains into the Mediterranean Sea. It is one of the world's largest river deltas—from Alexandria in the west to Po ...
, Canaan, and Nubia during the Second Intermediate Period.
Fourteenth Dynasty
The
14th Dynasty of Egypt was a Canaanite dynasty, which ruled the eastern Delta region just prior to the arrival of the Hyksos in Egypt. The Danish specialist
Kim Ryholt
Kim Steven Bardrum Ryholt (born 19 June 1970) is a professor of Egyptology at the University of Copenhagen and a specialist on Egyptian history and literature. He is director of the research centeCanon and Identity Formation in the Earliest Litera ...
has suggested that Yaqub-Har was a king of the late 14th Dynasty and the last one of this dynasty to be known from contemporary attestations.
[K.S.B. Ryholt: ''The Political Situation in Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period, c.1800–1550 BC'', Carsten Niebuhr Institute Publications, vol. 20. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 1997] Ryholt points to a scarab seal of Yaqub-Har which was discovered during excavations in
Tel Shikmona
Tel Shikmona ( he, תל שִׁקְמוֹנָה, translit= Šiqmônah), or Tell es-Samak ( ar, تل السمك, translit=Tell as-Samak), also spelt Sycamine, is an ancient Phoenician tell (mound) situated near the sea coast in the modern city of ...
in modern-day
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
. The archaeological context of the seal was dated to the
MB IIB period (Middle Bronze Age 1750 BC-1650 BC), which means that Yaqub-Har predated the 15th Dynasty.
Since the name "Yaqub-Har" may have a
West Semitic
The West Semitic languages are a proposed major sub-grouping of ancient Semitic languages. The term was first coined in 1883 by Fritz Hommel.[Har
Har or HAR may refer to:
People
* Har Bilas Sarda (1867-1955), Indian academic, judge and politician
* Har Sharma (1922–1992), Indian cricket umpire
Mythology
* Hár and Hárr, among the many names of Odin in Norse mythology
* Horus, an Eg ...]
", Yaqub-Har would then be a 14th Dynasty ruler. Ryholt's argument is based on the observation that while early
Hyksos
Hyksos (; Egyptian '' ḥqꜣ(w)- ḫꜣswt'', Egyptological pronunciation: ''hekau khasut'', "ruler(s) of foreign lands") is a term which, in modern Egyptology, designates the kings of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt (fl. c. 1650–1550 BC).
T ...
kings of the 15th Dynasty, such as
Sakir-Har
Sakir-Har (also Seker-Har and ''Skr-Hr'') was an Hyksos king of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt, ruling over some part of Lower Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period, possibly in the early 16th century BC.
Attestation
Sakir-Har is attested ...
, used the title ''Heka-Khawaset'', later Hyksos rulers adopted the traditional Egyptian royal titulary. This change happened under
Khyan
Seuserenre Khyan (also Khayan or Khian and Apachnan from the West Semitic Apaq-khyran) was an Hyksos king of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt, ruling over Lower Egypt in the second half of the 17th century BCE. His royal name Seuserenre translates ...
, who ruled as the ''Heka-Khawaset'' early in his reign, but later adopted the Egyptian prenomen ''Seuserenre''. Later Hyksos kings, such as
Apophis, abandoned the ''Heka-Khawaset'' title and retained instead the customary Egyptian prenomen, just like the kings of the 14th Dynasty. Ryholt then notes that Yaqub-Har himself always used a
prenomen
The ''praenomen'' (; plural: ''praenomina'') was a personal name chosen by the parents of a Roman child. It was first bestowed on the ''dies lustricus'' (day of lustration), the eighth day after the birth of a girl, or the ninth day after the bi ...
, ''Meruserre'', which suggests that he either ruled at the end of the 15th Dynasty or was a member of the Asiatic 14th Dynasty. Since the end of the 15th Dynasty is known not to have included a ruler by the name of Meruserre, Ryholt concludes that Yaqub-Har was a 14th Dynasty ruler.
[K. S. B. Ryholt: ''The Date of Kings Sheshi and Ya'qub-Har and the Rise of the Fourteenth Dynasty'', in: "The Second Intermediate Period: Current Research, Future Prospects", edited by M. Marée, Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 192, Leuven, Peeters, 2010, pp. 109–126.]
Fifteenth Dynasty
On the other hand, Daphna Ben-Tor and Suzanne Allen note that Yaqub-Har's scarab seals are stylistically almost identical with those of the well-attested Hyksos king
Khyan
Seuserenre Khyan (also Khayan or Khian and Apachnan from the West Semitic Apaq-khyran) was an Hyksos king of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt, ruling over Lower Egypt in the second half of the 17th century BCE. His royal name Seuserenre translates ...
. This suggests that Yaqub-Har was either Khyan's immediate
15th Dynasty
The Fifteenth Dynasty was a foreign dynasty of ancient Egypt. It was founded by Salitis, a Hyksos from West Asia whose people had invaded the country and conquered Lower Egypt. The 15th, 16th, and 17th Dynasties of ancient Egypt are often combin ...
successor or a vassal of the Hyksos king who ruled a part of the Egyptian Delta under Khyan's authority. As Ben-Tor writes, "Supporting evidence for the Fifteenth Dynasty affiliation of King Yaqubhar is provided by the close stylistic similarity between his scarabs and the scarabs of King
Khayan".
[Ben Tor in Marée, 2010, p.97] Additionally, the form of the ''wsr''-sign used in these kings' royal prenomina "argue for a chronological proximity
etween Yaqub-Har and Khyanand against Ryholt's assigning of Yaqub-Har to the Fourteenth Dynasty and Khayan to the Fifteenth Dynasty."
Popular speculation
In ''
Exodus Decoded
''The Exodus Decoded'' is a 2006 documentary film by "investigative archaeologist" and filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici and producer/director James Cameron. It aired April 16 on The History Channel. The documentary proposes naturalistic origins for th ...
'', filmmaker
Simcha Jacobovici
Simcha Jacobovici (; born April 4, 1953) is an Israeli-Canadian journalist and documentary film maker.
Biography
Simcha Jacobovici's parents were Holocaust survivors from Iași, Romania. He was born April 4, 1953, in Petah Tikva, Israel. In ...
suggested that Yaqub-Har was the Patriarch
Jacob
Jacob (; ; ar, يَعْقُوب, Yaʿqūb; gr, Ἰακώβ, Iakṓb), later given the name Israel, is regarded as a patriarch of the Israelites and is an important figure in Abrahamic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. J ...
, on the basis of a
signet ring
A seal is a device for making an impression in wax, clay, paper, or some other medium, including an embossment on paper, and is also the impression thus made. The original purpose was to authenticate a document, or to prevent interference with a ...
found in the Hyksos capital
Avaris
Avaris (; Egyptian: ḥw.t wꜥr.t, sometimes ''hut-waret''; grc, Αὔαρις, Auaris; el, Άβαρις, Ávaris; ar, حوّارة, Hawwara) was the Hyksos capital of Egypt located at the modern site of Tell el-Dab'a in the northeastern r ...
that read "Yakov/Yakub" (from Yaqub-her), similar to the Hebrew name of the Biblical patriarch Jacob (Ya'aqov). Jacobovici ignores the fact that Yaqub-Har is a well-attested pharaoh of the
Second Intermediate Period
The Second Intermediate Period marks a period when ancient Egypt fell into disarray for a second time, between the end of the Middle Kingdom and the start of the New Kingdom. The concept of a "Second Intermediate Period" was coined in 1942 by ...
; and Yakov and its variants are common
Semitic names from the period. Furthermore, Jacobovici provides no explanation as to why
Joseph
Joseph is a common male given name, derived from the Hebrew Yosef (יוֹסֵף). "Joseph" is used, along with "Josef", mostly in English, French and partially German languages. This spelling is also found as a variant in the languages of the mo ...
would have a signet ring with the name of his father Jacob.
Higgaion » The Exodus Decoded: An extended review, part 4
/ref>
References
External links
{{authority control
17th-century BC Pharaohs
16th-century BC Pharaohs
Pharaohs of the Fourteenth Dynasty of Egypt
Pharaohs of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt