Zoan in the Bible Encyclopedia - ISBE

zo'-an (tso`an; Tanis): 1. situation 2. Old Testament Notices 3. Early History 4. Hyksos Monuments 5. Hyksos Population 6. Hyksos Age 7. Description of Site 1. Situation: The name is supposed to mean "migration" (Arabic, tsan). The site is the only one connected with the history of Israel in Egypt, before the exodus, which is certainly fixed, being identified with the present village of San at the old mouth of the Bubastic branch of the Nile, about 18 miles Southeast of Damietta. It should be remembered that the foreshore of the Delta is continually moving northward, in consequence of the deposit of the Nile mud, and that the Nile mouths are much farther North than they were even in the time of the geographer Ptolemy. Thus in the times of Jacob, and of Moses, Zoan probably lay at the mouth of the Bubastic branch, and was a harbor, Lake Menzaleh and the lagoons near Pelusium having been subsequently formed...