Succoth (Egypt)

Overview

Succoth was the first camp of the Israelites after they set out from Rameses (Exodus 12:37; Numbers 33:5). It is a different place from the Succoth east of the Jordan, where Jacob built booths for his livestock (Genesis 33:17). The Egyptian Succoth is generally identified with Tjeku, the Egyptian name of the Wadi Tumilat, a valley of about 52 kilometres that once carried a branch of the Nile and was a main route between the Delta and Sinai. The land of Goshen is generally placed in the same valley.

Biblical Significance

"The people of Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth" (Exodus 12:37), and from Succoth they "encamped at Etham, on the edge of the wilderness" (Exodus 13:20). The record of the stages of the journey gives the same order: Rameses, Succoth, Etham (Numbers 33:5-6). On OTIC's dating, Israel camped here in 1446 BC, at the start of the Exodus.

Identification

In 1875 Heinrich Brugsch recognized the Egyptian name Tjeku (Tkw) as a writing of Semitic sukkot, "booths, shelters," and that reading remains widely accepted. In Egyptian texts Tjeku is the name of the Wadi Tumilat. Its earliest known writing is on an inscription at Serabit el-Khadim in Sinai from the reign of Thutmose IV, which names a troop commander of Tjeku, a sign of the valley's importance as an entryway into Egypt. Because Tjeku names the whole valley, Succoth is treated here as that district rather than as a single site. James Hoffmeier and Gary Rendsburg place the next camp, Etham, most likely at the valley's eastern end, where the wilderness begins.