22 EDOUARD NAVILLE ON 



south, and on the very bank of the Suez Canal, is an im- 

 portant Roman settlement, partly covered by the lagoons, but 

 the ruins of which above the water cover an area of 500 

 yards square. Tins I believe to be Serapiu, Pi Kerehet. Its 

 distance from Ero agrees nearly with the Itinerary, fourteen 

 Roman miles instead of eighteen. 



Let us now revert to the papyri, in order to get infor- 

 mation about two other places mentioned as landmarks for 

 the camp of the Israelites, Baal-Zephxm and Migdol. As for 

 the first, I quite agree with several scholars * that it must 

 not be considered as a city or even a village ; it was a place of 

 worship of a Semitic divinity in the form of a Baal. It was, 

 as the Targum explains it, the sanctuary of an idol, the shape 

 of which we do not know, but which may have been a mere 

 stone. I believe it was something like the tombs of sheikhs, 

 generally placed on hills, hundreds of which are met with in 

 Egypt, and where people go for worship or to make pilgrim- 

 ages, especially women. We might compare it also to the 

 solitary shrines or chapels which are often seen in Roman 

 Catholic countries. The word e^evavria^, " over against," used 

 by the Septuagint, seems to indicate that Baal Zephon was on 

 the other side of the sea. It was the point towards which 

 the camp of the Israelites was to make front, the direction in 

 which they were to march. It is very like the name of Baal- 

 Zapuna, which is read in one of the papyri of the British 

 Museum ; and if we adopt Philo's view, that Zaphon is the 

 North wind, t Baal Zephon was a divinity connected with the 

 wind, and with the navigation on the Red Sea. We have 

 no precise indication where it must be looked fur ; but as both 

 Pi Hahiroth and Migdol were in the district of Succoth, I 

 should place Baal Zephon on one of the heights between Lake 

 Timsah and the Bitter Lakes, like Sheikh Ennedek. 



We have more information about Migdol. It also is 

 derived from a papyrus in the British Museum; a letter from a 

 scribe who relates a journey very similar to that of the 

 Israelites, in the following words : J " I started from the great 

 hall of the royal palace on the ninth day of the month of 

 Epiphi, at the time of night, going after two slaves. When 

 I arrived at the enclosure (sega'ir) of Succoth, on the tenth of 



* See Graetz, in Thayer, " The Hebrews and the Ked Sea," p. 129. 

 Dillmann, " Exodus," p. 142: " Der Ortsname — war ohne Frage hergenommen 

 von e ner dort betindlichen Cultusstatte einer Form des iiaal . . . ." 



t Ebers, " Durch Gosen zum Sinai," p. 525. 



I Brugsch, " Diet. Geog.," p. 51. 



