Punon

Overview

Punon was a settlement in the lowlands of Edom, on the eastern side of the Arabah south of the Dead Sea, and a station on Israel's journey through the wilderness. Its site is identified with Faynan in southern Jordan, whose modern name preserves the ancient one, at the center of one of the largest copper-ore districts in the ancient Near East.

Biblical Significance

Numbers 33:42-43 records that Israel set out from Zalmonah and camped at Punon, then moved on to Oboth, in the final stage of the journey toward the plains of Moab. Pinon, listed among the chiefs of Edom in Genesis 36:41, is generally connected with the same name. The copper industry of the district reached industrial scale in the 10th and 9th centuries BC, the era of David and Solomon. In the Roman period the mining settlement was known as Phaino.