‘We shouldn’t be doing this,’ said Daniel, still in a daze from what had happened as he sat in the driver’s seat of the car outside the visitor centre.
‘Doing what?’
‘Running away. If they find Sheikh Ibrahim’s body back in that cave—’
‘They won’t find it. At least not for a long time.’
‘We can’t just leave him there. His family has a right to know… to give him a decent burial—’
‘Okay, but we need to buy some time.’
‘For what? At the moment we’re just wasting time.’
His heart was still pounding, after both the events at the cave and the long trek back.
‘Well, I for one would like to know what’s in The Book of the Wars of the Lord.’
And with that she took the tablets out of the carrier bag and put them on the space between the seats.
‘We can hardly go through it here.’
‘Why not?’
‘Well, how long is it?’
‘There are five tablets.’
She picked up the first of them.
‘What’s the hurry?’ he asked irritably. ‘Why don’t we just take it back to Israel?’
‘And what if we’re searched and they catch us trying to smuggle historical artefacts out of Jordan? I don’t know how this is going to pan out, but if we’re arrested now, there’s a chance that we may never see these tablets again. Now I don’t know about you, but if these tablets were written by the hand of the biblical Moses, then I want to see them translated.’
‘Then maybe we should just turn it in to the authorities here.’
‘And never see it again? Remember what Ibrahim said about those bones. They took them to the university and wouldn’t talk about them after that.’
Daniel realized she was right. This was a piece of ancient history they held in their hands. And there was no guarantee that they would get another chance like this.
‘Okay.’
Gabrielle breathed a sigh of relief as Daniel put a large, illustrated guidebook on his lap and then placed the first of the tablets on it. He raised one knee to tilt the tablet slightly to catch the light better and then studied the script.
‘Can you read it?’ she asked.
‘Barely.’
I was fed milk from the breast of an Israeli woman and her son was like a brother to me, more than my brother Sethi, the son of Mernepteh, my King, my Lord whom I served with loyalty despite his wickedness to Israel.
‘Wait a minute,’ he said, breaking off. ‘Can you work out from that who the author might have been?’
Gabrielle gave this a few moments’ thought.
‘Let’s see. He refers to Sethi as his brother. Now there were a number of people called Sethi,’ she said ponderously. ‘But he also calls him the son of Mernepteh! That’s the one who wrote the famous Mernepteh stele that we saw at the museum back in Cairo. So that would make his son Sethi the Second. And that means that this was written by someone called Amenmesse who may or may not have been Sethi the Second’s brother but who was certainly involved in a power struggle with Sethi the Second.’
‘Is there any evidence that this Amenmesse had a Jewish wet nurse?’
‘There’s no record of it. But then again, not much is known about him at all. It certainly wouldn’t have been impossible by any means.’
‘I was just thinking about the story of Moses,’ said Daniel. ‘After his mother hid him in the bulrushes and he was found by Pharaoh’s daughter, his real mother came forward and offered to be his wet nurse.’
‘Then this reference to her other son being more like a brother than Sethi…’ She trailed off.
‘Could be a reference to Moses’ brother Aaron.’
‘Go on,’ she prompted.
The wife of Mernepteh bore a son without the spirit of life and he asked the priests of Amun what sin he had committed that he be punished in this way and they told him that it was not his sin but that of Shifra the woman who brought the baby out of its mother for she was an Israelite woman and she worshipped false gods. And he had her put to death and he decreed that for one year all the male children of Israel shall be put to death.
They looked at each other, astonished.
‘The slaying of the firstborn son,’ she said. ‘Just like on that papyrus that was found at the same site as the Mernepteh stele.’
‘Not quite,’ said Daniel. ‘The slaying of the firstborn Egyptian son was the last of the ten plagues. However, this refers to Pharaoh’s decree that all the male Israelite babies be put to death – hence the incident with Moses being hidden in the bulrushes. But of course there is an approximate symmetry between the two events and also, I guess, a certain poetic irony.’
‘So it could be that this one event was the source material for both those biblical legends?’
‘I suppose. But does this fit the Egyptian record?’
‘Only that papyrus Mansoor showed us, which was written in Proto-Sinaitic. There’s nothing specific in the annals to confirm it, but that doesn’t rule it out. If you take the line in the Mernepteh stele about “Israel is laid waste, nought of seed” and combine it with the papyrus and now this, then I suppose it counts as a record. How does it continue?’
Daniel read aloud.
An Israelite man had been adopted into the household of the chief of works in the Place of Truth and he was brought before the judge for punishment and the judge decreed that he shall be beaten. And so he begged to put his plea to me. And I heard his plea and I remembered the pain that my brother had inflicted upon his people. So I spared him and I dismissed the judge.
‘Papyrus Salt 124!’ Gabrielle blurted out, letting the excitement get the better of her academic reserve.
‘What’s that?’
‘Remember what we talked about when you were released on bail after my visit to the British Museum? The Place of Truth is the village where the artisans and craftsmen who worked in the necropolis lived.’
‘I remember, but what has—’
‘Wait! Let me explain. Henry Salt was a contemporary of William John Bankes. He was one of that whole crowd of Victorian British explorers and adventurers from the great age of Empire who travelled to Egypt and the Middle East in search of the treasures of the ancient world. He was a wealthy man and during the course of his travels he acquired a papyrus now known as Papyrus Salt 124. It was one of a number of papyri that he donated to the British Museum.’
‘And what made you think of that just now?’
‘Because that’s what this is about! It refers to the same events.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘The papyrus consists of a complaint by the brother of someone called Neferhotep. Neferhotep was the works foreman for the necropolis. And the complaint is mainly against someone called Paneb, but also partly against someone called Mossy or Mussi.’
‘And who were they?’
‘Paneb was Neferhotep’s adopted son. Mossy or Mussi was someone in a position of authority who took Paneb’s side when the case against Paneb was brought to judgement. And Mossy or Mussi also appears to be the author of this text.’
‘But I thought you said that the man who wrote this text was called Amenmesse.’
‘Yes, but there has long been speculation and debate as to whether Amenmesse and Mossy were one and the same. And the problem is compounded by the almost biblical use of ambiguous pronouns.’
‘So wait a minute – what exactly happened? I mean, who judged who and what was the outcome?’
‘That’s what I’m trying to explain. The complaint makes all manner of accusations, some of them quite possibly exaggerated. It starts off by saying that Neferhotep, the complainant’s brother, was killed by some unspecified “enemy” – a term usually reserved for a traitor to Egypt. Then it says that Paneb usurped his role as works foreman by bribing a corrupt vizier with five of the late Neferhotep’s own slaves. But the complaint also goes on to list all manner of other crimes allegedly committed by Paneb during Neferhotep’s lifetime, including stealing from the necropolis, threatening to kill Neferhotep, beating up nine guards that Neferhotep set to guard him by night and various rapes of both women and boys.’
Daniel was puzzled by this account. ‘So why didn’t Neferhotep bring the complaint himself? Before he was killed by this “enemy”, I mean?’
‘Well, first of all, like I said, there may be an element of exaggeration in the complaint itself. But secondly, Neferhotep did bring a complaint against Paneb to the vizier – not the corrupt vizier, but his honest predecessor. According to the papyrus, the vizier who heard the complaint upheld the claims and ordered that Paneb be flogged for his crimes. But Paneb then appealed the ruling and the appeal came before this Mossy or Mussi.’
‘And who was this Mossy or Mussi?’ asked Daniel.
‘We don’t know who he was. But one thing we can be sure of is that he must have been someone of high enough rank to veto the local vizier. One suggestion is that it was Amenmesse who ruled part of Egypt during his power struggle with Sethi the Second. Another is that it was someone called Messuwy, who had previously been the pharaoh’s viceroy in Nubia. Yet another theory is that they were one and the same – although there is some vigorous debate about this.’
‘Well, from what you’ve said, Gaby, this text suggests that it was Amenmesse.’
‘Yes, but the name Mossy sounds like Messuwy. So taken as a whole it could also be interpreted as meaning that they were one and the same. Anyway, go on!’
Daniel turned to the second tablet, which lay between them on top of the remaining two. He switched on the car light to illuminate it better and continued reading.
When my brother Sethi heard of this he was angry with me and wanted to kill me. So I fled to a place nearby where I came face to face with the one true God, whose face cannot be seen. He appeared to me in fire on this sacred ground and revealed his true name to me and it was Jehovah. And he commanded me to end the cruelty against Israel. So awed was I by this wondrous place that I engraved words in the writing style of Israel upon the stones nearby.
‘Wadi el-hol!’ said Gabrielle.
The name sounded familiar to Daniel. ‘The place where they found an early sample of the ancient script?’
‘Yes! Remember… it’s only twenty miles from the workers’ village. He must have run away when he realized that the pharaoh was after him.’
Suddenly Daniel found himself gripped by the excitement of a profound realization. ‘Then this phrase “appeared to me in fire” must be a reference to the burning bush… the burning bush which Moses saw after he ran away from…’
‘What?’ asked Gabrielle.
‘After he killed the Egyptian taskmaster who was beating an Israelite slave!’
‘Holy shit!’ said Gabrielle. ‘It really happened… maybe not quite the way the Bible described it, but it really happened.’
There were tears in Daniel’s eyes.
‘And Mossy must have been…’
‘Moses,’ Gabrielle muttered, barely able to raise her voice above a whisper.