Fantastic Metropolis

Sargon, the mighty king, king of Agade, am I.
My mother was a changeling, my father I knew not.
The brothers of my father loved the hills.
My city is Azupiranu, which is situated on the Euphrates.
My changeling mother conceived me, in secret she bore me.
She set me in a basket of rushes, with bitumen she sealed my lid.
She cast me into the river which rose not up over me.

—From the Legend of Sargon, The Ancient Near East, edited by James B. Pritchard

And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi. And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months. And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river’s brink. And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him.

—Exodus 2:1–4

We know that the kings of Egypt spread rumors that Apepi, the Hyksos king, had broken with Seth his god (they went so far as to transform Apepi into the great serpent who sought to devour Ra in his barque, making Apepi one of the many titles of the snake we know today as Apophis) and they went even further, actually adopting Seth, this god of foreigners and deserts, as their own and giving him a role of respect alongside their sun god himself. Seth would stay “redeemed,” as it were, for centuries and was even the patron god of the Ramessid kings themselves at the time that the war with the Assyrians and Hattusans was heating up… Seti was, after all, named for Seth, and Seth was victory’s father. We also know that in the fore of the Hyksos entry into Egypt, the semitic Palestinians were driven into the land, those self-same Palestinians who would become known to the Egyptians as Habiru.

The arm of the mighty king conquers the land of Naharaim and the land of Cush, but now the Habiru capture the cities of the king. There is not a single governor to the king, my lord - all have perished! Behold, Turbazu has been slain in the very gate of Sile, yet the king holds the peace. Behold Zimreda, the townsmen of Lachish have smitten him, slaves who had become Habiru.

—The Amarna Letters, The Ancient Near East, Volume I, edited by James B. Pritchard

These are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob, each with his household: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah, Is’sachar, Zeb’ulun, and Benjamin, Dan and Naph’tali, Gad and Asher. All the offspring of Jacob were seventy persons; Joseph was already in Egypt. Then Joseph died, and all his brothers, and all that generation. But the descendants of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly; they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong, so that the land was filled with them.

—Exodus, 1:1–8