How did Memphis get its name?

Answer 1

It was founded by John Overton, James Winchester, and Andrew Jackson and was named after Memphis, Egypt. For information about the significance of Memphis, Egypt, refer: ANSWER "Memphis" of Egypt is the way Greek speakers, in ancient times, read the hieroglyphs for this age-old Egyptian capital city. A proper reading is "Memphit". A parallel is found amongst Hebrew speakers. Ashkenazi Jews say "Shabbas" but Sephardi Jews say "Shabbath". Also, Egyptologists of all generations faced a similar problem - which order to read the hieroglyphs. Frequently hieroglyphs are written in the form of an acrostic. Thus "Ptah" can also be read "Hotep". The way these things are read is often by convention. Once an Egyptologist (from any generation) succeeded in getting a name read in a particular way, it stuck, and no one wanted to change things because others in the field would only get more confused. Thus with Memphis-Memphit we have another problem. It should be read Phit-Mem. That is the name we read in Exodus 1:11 or "Pithom". But we know from Exodus 14:2 and Numbers 33:7 that Memphis-Phithom was also known as Migdol. But this latter name was the one used much later when Jewish Scribes writing out the replacement scrolls of the Scriptures (after a set got too old for further use) in circa 700-500 BC referred to the Phoenician or Carthaginian city with its towers (Migdolim). In intervening periods, Assyrians, Ethiopians, Carthaginians and the Ramesside kings, all wrestled for control of Memphis-Memphit-Pithom, City of Ramesses or Migdol. From all of this, we need to return to the 12th dynasty, which seems to have been the first in which the city was first significantly expanded, in order to find a meaning for Memphis. The last kings of this dynasty were named Amenemhat. The third king with that name ruled for 43 years. He was the king Moses had to flee from for 40 years. The place (or palace) of Amenemhat would be Pi-Amen-em-hat. "Em hat" probably means "the leader" or "chosen one of", in this case The God Amen (or Amun). It's essentially an expression of the Law of Primogeniture and Divine Right of Kings. This man had been chosen (in the womb so to speak) by the god "Amun" to lead Egypt. A Hebrew scribe not wishing to name the foreign god in the holy texts simply referred to the Egyptian capital as The "Pi-em-hat". In Hieroglyphs this is "P-M-Th". Depending on the way one reads the hieroglyph cluster, this might be read "P-Th-M" or "Pithom". Thus the cities of Pithom and Ramesses in Exodus 1:11 are not two capital cities on two different sites in two different parts of Egypt during the time of Moses of Israel, but two capital cities on the same site in two different eras. The Biblical text requires that Jews or Israelites built both cities. The verb 'to build' refers to both "Pithom" and "Raamses". We call this redaction. A later name is used to describe a place which formerly had an alternative name that was no longer in use and therefore misleading to continue to use. We should read in Exodus 1:11, "... built for the pharaoh the capital city Pithom (Raamses)". In 1500 BC, ancient Israelites made bricks for the building sites at Memphis. In 600 BC, Jeremiah went to Migdol (or Tahpanhes, Si-en-Ptah, Noph-Phon-icia) to stop the Jews of his generation once again making bricks at the Memphis brick-kilns (Jeremiah 44). This seems to explain the enigma of "Rameses" appearing in Genesis 47:11 (about 1900 BC) and "Raamses" appearing in Exodus 1:11 (about 1485 BC). The ramessides only ruled Egypt for about 100 years. Actually, twelve of them ruled contemporaneously as Herodotus inadvertently noted although he did not name the leaders in the temporary constitutional experiment he referred to as "ramessides". These points help prove the general contention that the dynastic king lists are wrongly dated (or back-dated in time) by as much as 600 (XIX), 500 (XVIII) or 250 years (XII) depending on certain factors or dynasty. To explain how Memphis of Egypt got its name involves unravelling a lot of modern myth about ancient Egyptian history. To start the ball rolling, The Bible should be our guide because its history and chronology has not been tainted by anything like the same degree of human error as modern Egyptology. Admittedly some scribes may have mistaken the correct order in which to transliterate Egyptian hieroglyphs into Hebrew. But everyone has difficulty there. To say Ramesses II and his son Merneptah Baenre Meriamun Hotephirmaat lived in the 13th century and not the 7th century BC is a grave error. Merneptah said "Israel's seed is destroyed; The land razed to the Ground". That was Israel in 586 BC after Nebuchadnezzar sacked the country for the third time. Nebuchadnezzar also castrated many Jewish men to take them into his bureaucracy to run his ever-growing empire. Merneptah's statement makes no sense in 1210 BC his normally accredited date for accession to the throne of Egypt. It makes plenty of sense in 586 BC. Therefore, if Merneptah is the son of Ramesses II, the 'great' king ruled between Egypt from Memphis circa 650-610 BC not 1250 BC.