pithom Summary and Overview

Egyptian, Pa-Tum, "house of Tum," the sun-god, one of the "treasure" cities built for Pharaoh Rameses II. by the Israelites (Ex. 1:11). It was probably the Patumos of the Greek historian Herodotus. It has now been satisfactorily identified with Tell-el-Maskhuta, about 12 miles west of Ismailia, and 20 east of Tel-el-Kebir, on the southern bank of the present Suez Canal. Here have recently (1883) been discovered the ruins of supposed grain-chambers, and other evidences to show that this was a great "store city." Its immense ruin-heaps show that it was built of bricks, and partly also of bricks without straw. Succoth (Ex. 12:37) is supposed by some to be the secular name of this city, Pithom being its sacred name. This was the first halting-place of the Israelites in their exodus. It has been argued (Dr. Lansing) that these "store" cities "were residence cities, royal dwellings, such as the Pharaohs of old, the Kings of Israel, and our modern Khedives have ever loved to build, thus giving employment to the superabundant muscle of their enslaved peoples, and making a name for themselves."

(the city of justice), one of the store-cites Israelites for the first oppressor, the Pharaoh "which knew not Joseph." #Ex 1:11| It is probably the Patumus of Herodotus (ii. 1 159), a town on the borders of Egypt, nest which Necho constructed a canal from the Nile to the Arabian Gulf.

PI'THOM (house, or temple, of Tum, who was the Sun-god of Heliopolis), a "treasure city," or depot of provisions, built by the Israelites in Goshen. Ex 1:11. It was probably not far from the "Bitter Lakes" of Suez and near the canal. Some critics identify it with the Patoumos of Herodotus and the Thoum of the Antonine Itinerary, between Heliopolis and Pelusium, 50 Roman miles from the former and 48 miles from the latter. M. Naville identifies Pithom with PaTum, "setting sun," and with Tel el-Maskhuta, where he made excavations in 1883, and found remarkable ruins, brick grain-chambers, and similar evidences of a "store city." The conclusions of M. Naville have been disputed, but Poole, Sayce, and other Egyptologists accept his '"find" as settling the question of Pithom. According to this view, Rameses II. was its founder.

An Egyptian store city built by Israelites for their oppressor (Exodus 1:11). Identified by Brugsch with the fort of Djar, Pachtum. It existed early in the 18th dynasty, before Thothmes III (the Pharaoh who perished in the Red Sea), and was probably erected by his grandfather Aahmes I. The fort subsequently was called Heroopolis. The Egyptian name is Pe Tum, "the house (temple) of Tum," the sun god of Heliopolis. Chabas translated an Egyptian record, mentioning a "reservoir (berekoovota, a slightly modified Hebrew word; confirming the Scripture that ascribes the building to Hebrew) at Pithom on the frontier of the desert." Pithom was on the canal dug or enlarged long before under Osirtasin of the 12th dynasty. Rameses II subsequently fortified and enlarged it and Raamses. Lepsius says the son of Aahmes I was RHMSS. The Rameses, two centuries subsequently, have a final "-u", Ramessu. Brugsch thinks the Israelites started from Raamses, which he thinks to be Zoan or Tauis, and journeying toward the N.E. reached the W. of lake Sirbonit, separated from the Mediterranean by a narrow neck of land. From Mount Kasios here they turned S. through the Bitter Lakes to the N. of the gulf of Suez; then to the Sinai peninsula. In the inscriptions Heracleopolis Parva near Migdol is named Piton "in the district of Succoth" (a Hebrew word meaning "tents"). The place is also called Pt-Ramses "the city of Ramses." (Jewish Intelligencer, Jan. 1877.)