Speaker 2
I have a story about this island. Back in 2011, I went with my family and in-laws on a like Aswan de Luxor, sort of Nile boat ride. And we went by Elphantine. And I said to our guide, I said, Hey, that's, I can't believe we're right here. And there was a Jewish colony there. And he's like, no, there wasn't. And I said, yeah, there was. There's, you know, pathological evidence about them. And, you know, we can actually read about this. He's like, no, there wasn't. There was no Jewish community there. I was like, OK, that's the official line. So it was a very odd thing. I don't know what kind of politically was behind that or what, but it was a very strange encounter. So I, we proceeded past it. I did not get off. And I wish I had and been able to dig around in the dirt a bit. But anyway, that's my brush with Elphantine. Interesting, interesting. Yeah, I'm curious
Speaker 1
about that. Some songs, some, I don't know, some political misgivings or any with that history. Who knows what's going on there. But yeah, I don't actually know myself what you would have been able to see had you gotten off the boat.
Speaker 2
Yeah, exactly. How much is visible? Yeah, it's probably all overgrown from my memory. I'm trying to think of like what I could even visibly say. I think it was just a lot of vegetation from what I remember. But it's a bit fuzzy. That was 11 years ago now. So what are the sources of our
Speaker 1
information about this Jewish colony? Yeah. Well, thankfully now scholars can access the pretty remarkable multi volume. Work edited by Basil of Horton and a day, Ada Yardani textbook of Aramaic documents from ancient Egypt. And those are each arranged by John Ross. You can let the letters administrative documents and so on. So that's a handy go to and pretty comprehensive gazetteer, if you will, of Elphantine documents, Aramaic documents from Egypt, of which most are from, you know, they're mostly
Speaker 2
from the island.
