Standing out among the uncovered ruins of Avaris, Tell ed-Daba Area F, are the remains of a palace of a high-ranking official, excavated by Manfred Bietak with the Austrian Institute for Egyptology. It is understood its chief occupant was a high-ranking Semitic official, on account of the graves in the cemetery of its palace garden. The honour given this Asiatic (another term for Semite) by the Egyptian crown included a pyramid tomb with a massive statue to commemorate his memory. The statue bore a striped, multi-colored coat, as fitting that referenced in Genesis 37:3-4, yellow-painted skin and flame-red hair, and held in its hand a throw-stick – all quintessential marks of Semite ethnicity. That a Semitic official would be honoured with a pyramid tomb is an anomaly with no equivalent in ancient Egyptian history. It was found in Stratum G/4, dated to the 12th Dynasty, evidencing the ‘early Israelite period’ at Avaris.
Unlike any of the other main graves, which retained their bones and buried valuables, the body in the pyramid tomb had long been removed in what seems to be an act of piety (grave robbers plunder treasure, not bones). Matching what is related in the Torah and Book of Joshua: per the request of Joseph, that his bones not be left behind in Egypt but be brought to the Promised Land (Gen. 50,24-25), Moses himself brought Joseph’s remains to the border of Canaan (Ex. 13,19), after which they were buried in Shechem (Joshua 24,32).
22Now Joseph stayed in Egypt, he and his father’s household, and Joseph lived one hundred and ten years. 23Joseph saw the third generation of Ephraim’s sons; also the sons of Machir, the son of Manasseh, were born on Joseph’s knees. 24Joseph said to his brothers, “I am about to die, but God will surely take care of you and bring you up from this land to the land which He promised on oath to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob.” 25Then Joseph made the sons of Israel swear, saying, “God will surely take care of you, and you shall carry my bones up from here.” 26So Joseph died at the age of one hundred and ten years; and he was embalmed and placed in a coffin in Egypt.
Genesis 50:22-26
1Now these are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob; they came each one with his household: 2Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah; 3Issachar, Zebulun and Benjamin; 4Dan and Naphtali, Gad and Asher. 5All the persons who came from the loins of Jacob were seventy in number, but Joseph was already in Egypt. 6Joseph died, and all his brothers and all that generation.7But the sons of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly, and multiplied, and became exceedingly mighty, so that the land was filled with them.