Explorations in Bible lands during the 19th century - H. V. Hilprecht

650 EXPLORATIONS IN BIBLE LANDS
situated the Biblical Pithom, which was called in Egyptian
Per-Atum, " House of the god Atum," and which also bore
the profane name of Seku. The temple was surrounded by
a wall, inside of which was the little sanctuary built by
Rameses II. to the god of the city, Atom. Not far from
the temple, granaries were discovered, which took the shape
of deep rectangular compartments without doors, into which
the grain was poured from the top. To judge from the
bricks of which they are built, they belong to the time of
Rameses II., and it is therefore possible that they may
be the store cities built by the Israelites at the command
of Pharaoh. Naville's excavations have further proved
that Tell el-Maskhuta contains the remains of the ancient
Ero or Heroonpolis, at which, according to the Greek
translation of the Scriptures, the meeting took place between
Joseph and his father, and which in a Coptic translation is
regarded as identical with Pithom.
As the real seat of the Hebrews we find in the Old Testament
the land of Goshen, the ge Gesem 'Arabias of the
Septuagint. This Gesem (in Egyptian also Gesem) has been
rediscovered by Naville in the ruins called to-day Saft el-
Henne, to the east of Zaqaziq. It was the capital of a
particular district called
:
'Arabias nomos, and was known by
the profane name of Per-Sopt, " House of the god Sopt."
The Egyptian name of the god has survived in the modern
Arabic name of the god. The land of Goshen must therefore
be looked for in the neighborhood of Saft el-Henne.
In that district to the east of the Bubastic branch of the
Nile, perhaps in the triangle formed by the cities Zaqaziq,
Belbes and Abu Hammad, the Septuagint has placed the
traditional sojourn of the Israelites, and it is highly probable
that the old (Jehovistic) narrator meant by the " Land of
Goshen " this district in the eastern part of the Delta.
Many other ruins were examined in this eastern part of
the Delta, but most of them are not of very great interest.