Pharaoh of Egypt
Merneptah
Active
1213–1203 BCE
A stele from his reign contains the earliest known external reference to a people called Israel.
What the sources say
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3 statements
A people named 'Israel' already lived in Canaan during the thirteenth century BCE. A precisely datable stele preserves their name in a victory song commissioned during the Egyptian ruler Merneptah's reign, about 1213 to 1203 BCE. The book's timeline therefore places Israel in Canaan by 1207 BCE.
The stele's lines list enemies Merneptah defeated in Canaan: Canaan itself, Ashkelon, Gezer, Yanoam and Israel, the last declared devastated and without offspring. The claim was exaggerated, since, as the authors wryly put it, otherwise this book would have been very short.
The Egyptians used special signs to mark what kind of thing a word named. On the stele, Ashkelon, Gezer and Yanoam carry the sign for a city-state, while Israel carries the sign for a people or ethnic group. The difference may indicate that the early Israelites were not tied to a city but were a rural or nomadic people, which fits Genesis's description.