143. Tanis - (Tell al-Hajar)
ORIGINAL TEXTS Tanis civitas Aegypti, sicut Iesaias et Iezechiel scribunt. (Jerome 165,22)	ENGLISH TRANSLATION Eusebius, Onomasticon 164,23 (ca. 295 A.D.); Jerome 165,22 (ca. 390 A.D.) Tanis (Isaiah 19:11; Ezechiel 30:14), a city of Egypt, as Isaiah and Ezechiel write.
BIBLICAL BACKGROUND Num 13:22 Hebron, a city more ancient than Zoan (Tanis ?) They went up into the Negeb, and came to Hebron; and Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the Anakites, were there. (Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) Ps 78:12-13 The Lord worked wonders in Egypt Marvellous things did he in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt, in the field of Zoan [= Tanis?]. He clave the sea, and caused them to pass through; And he made the waters to stand as a heap. Is 19:11-15 Oracle against Egypt The princes of Zoan are utterly foolish; the wise counselors of Pharaoh give stupid counsel. How can you say to Pharaoh, "I am one of the sages, a descendant of ancient kings"? Where now are your sages? Let them tell you and make known what the Lord of hosts has planned against Egypt. The princes of Zoan have become fools, and the princes of Memphis are deluded; those who are the cornerstones of its tribes have led Egypt astray. The Lord has poured into them a spirit of confusion; and they have made Egypt stagger in all its doings as a drunkard staggers around in vomit. Neither head nor tail, palm branch or reed, will be able to do anything for Egypt. Ezek 30:12-16 Oracle against Egypt I will dry up the channels, and will sell the land into the hand of evildoers; I will bring desolation upon the land and everything in it by the hand of foreigners; I the Lord have spoken. Thus says the Lord GOD: I will destroy the idols and put an end to the images in Memphis; there shall no longer be a prince in the land of Egypt; so I will put fear in the land of Egypt. I will make Pathros a desolation, and will set fire to Zoan [=Tanis?], and will execute acts of judgment on Thebes.
MORE ANCIENT SOURCES Josephus, Antiquities 1.8.3 (1st cent. A.D.) (169) [Abram] dwelt in Hebron, which is a city seven years more ancient than Tanis of Egypt. Egeria, Itinerarium 9 (381-384 A.D.) Our whole journey on from there led through the land of Goshen, past vineyards (of grapes as well as balsam), orchards, well-kept fields, and many gardens. All the way the road followed the bank of the Nile past the extremely fertile farms which had once been the estates of the children of Israel, and really I do not think I have ever seen a landscape better kept than Goshen. From the City of Arabia we travelled for two days through the land of Goshen, and then we arrived at Tathnis, in the city which was once Pharaoh's capital, in which holy Moses was born. This district, as I have told you, was already known to me from the time when I visited Alexandria and the Thebaid, but we had to go back to the land of Goshen and on to Tathnis because I wanted to learn more about the places which the children of Israel visited on the way from Rameses to Sinai, the Mount of God. From Tathnis we went by the way I already knew, and arrived at Pelusium. BYZANTINE ADMINISTRATIVE LISTS Hierocles, Synecdemos 726:3-727:6 (7th cent. A.D.) Province of Augustamnica Prima, 13 cities under a corrector: Rhinocorura, Ostracina, Casium, Pentaschoinon, Aphnaion, Gerra, the Tents, Pelusium, Sethroitis, Hephaestus, Panephusis, Tanis, Thmuis. Georgius Cyprius, 685-700 (7th cent. A.D.) Province of Augustamnica Prima: Pelusium, Setroithes, Tanis, Thmuis, Rhinocorura, Ostracine, Pentaschoinon, Casium, Aphnaion, Ephaestos, Panephysis, the Tents outside Gerra, the Tents inside Gerra, Thennesos. EPISCOPAL CITY Bishops' list Eudaemon, meletian (A.D. 325, 343) Elias (A.D. 338) Theodorus (A.D. 338) Hermion (A.D. 362) Apollonius (A.D. 449, 451) Paulus (A.D. 458) Mark, coptic (A.D. 799) Isaac, coptic (A.D. 831) Demetrius, coptic (A.D. 831/49) ? (A.D. 933/40) Mennas, coptic (A.D. 979/1003) Symeon, coptic (A.D. 1047) Michael, coptic

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