"Moses called down a host of calamities upon Egypt until the pharaoh finally freed the Israelites. Perhaps he had the help of a comet impact coupled with a volcano.
A volcano destroyed the island of Santorini in the Aegean Sea (between today's Greece and Turkey) around the middle of the second millennium B.C. Researchers Val LaMarche and Kathy Hirschboeck suggest the volcano might be associated with tree-ring evidence for several years of intense cold beginning in 1627 B.C
. "Could that form the basis for strange meteorological phenomena recorded in the biblical book of Exodus? In the book of Exodus, which describes events a few hundred kilometers from Santorini, we read of a pillar of cloud and fire, a lingering darkness, and the parting of the Red Sea. An enormous column of ash must have hung in the sky over the eruption (the Israelites’ “pillar of cloud by day and fire by night?”), and the volcano doubtless caused a tsunami, or tidal wave (which could have drowned a pharaoh's army)."
"The Exodus story is traditionally dated to either the thirteenth or fifteenth century B.C. Those dates, however, depend ultimately on identifying the “Pharaoh of the Oppression,” and historians have never proven to which ruler that infamous title referred."
Most believed Ramses II to be the pharaoh of the Exodus. That doesn't seem to fit. The latest evidence of the timeline from the Egyptian side places Ramses as late as 925bc as the Shishak that plundered Jerusalem. Others tend to favor Seti I .
Ramses was dated at one point to the 13th century BC. That is substantially later than 1627 and makes the linkage impossible with regard to the volcano theory. Other problems arise here as well. Solomon's reign would be ending in the time of Ramses II, making Solomon a Contemporary of Seti I. Solomon married Egyptian Royalty.
His wife would necessarily come from the court of Seti or Ramses. In any case, neither of them could be the pharaoh of the Exodus. Going backward, you have Solomon's father, David, sitting as Second King of Israel, then Saul who was the first. Saul has linkage with a prior pharaoh under his birth name Lebayou (sp?). This doesn't point to the pharaoh of the Exodus; but, it does rule out who could not have been.
Shoshenq I's Chief Archetect is recorded in a generational family tree that has been dated to year 26 of the reign of Darius I. Also listed in that family tree is the cheif architect of Ramses. So these aren't fixed dates for the beginnings and endings of the reigns, it just tells us who was reigning at a given snapshot in time. Shoshenq was reigning by the family tree in 776. Ramses II was in 925.
We know Seti I reigned into his 90s. And the Amarna letters
tie Saul to Ankhenaton. Saul was the first King of Israel after the Exodus. The letters to Pharaoh from Saul tie in nicely to biblical events recorded. Ankhenaton reigned under the name Amenhotep IV. This would rule out the conjecture about Tutankhamun being the firstborn son killed at passover.
Linkages have been drawn between Joseph and Amenemhet III which seem to support the later timeline - framing things in as it were. The Bar Joseph waterway from that period still bears Joseph's name. What seems problematic to me is the explosion of kings in the 13th Dynasty combined with the imprecision of dating in general. There are also a lot of assumptions made as to when many of the Kings ruled. Some dynasties seem to have been co-ruling instead of ruling in dynastic order - a kingdom divided between upper and lower Egypt as it were. Not altogether unexpected; but, a blind eye seems to prevail in attempt to stretch the timeline for reasons obvious to some and embarrassing to others when the corrections are made. I find it interesting the linkages made at Megiddo to Solomon. A building not matching his recorded building style and requirement is identified as his in preference over one that matches it precisely. Why? Because the one matching doesn't match the presumed "layer" in which Solomon is expected to be found. Faced with the contradiction, the hard evidence of the matching structure is abandoned in preference to the conjectural dating method of the layers. IMHO, this is a lot of what is wrong with science today. Ideologies get in the way of methodology. One should be following the evidence.
Anyway, I'm off to bed. Have fun with it.