Genesis 47:11

Land of Rameses] or Raamses. Evidently identical with the 'land of Goshen '(Genesis 47:4 and Genesis 47:6). The name here is probably anticipatory of the time of the great Rameses, who made his court at Zoan: see on Exodus 1:11.

14-25. From being owners of the land the people became tenants of the crown. They remained on the land, paying one-fifth of the produce for state requirements, and retaining four-fifths for their own use. In such a fertile land as Egypt these conditions must be regarded as much more favourable than in some Eastern states in the present day, such as Turkey and Persia, where the peasants have to hand over from a half to three-fourths of the produce of the land to the government. See Dillmann, and on Genesis 47:25.

16, 17. When Joseph took the people's cattle which they were unable to support in the dried-up Nile valley, he probably removed them to Goshen (cp. Genesis 47:6) until the famine was ended.