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Buto, a town in the north-west Delta on the Sebennytic Nile, was probably near the village of Ibtu; cf. Petrie (E. E. F. xxvi. (1904-5) pp. 36-8); it was famous for its oracle (cf. cc. 152, 155). Leto is the Egyptian Uat, the patron deity of the Lower Delta.

Papremis (cf. cc. 71, 165 for the ‘nome’ of Papremis) was the site of the battle in 460 B. C., when Inaros defeated Achaemenes (iii. 12.4); its exact position is uncertain, but Sourdille (E. p. 90 seq.) shows that probably it was the original native town which was absorbed later by the Greek Pelusium (so Rhakoti was absorbed by Alexandria). His arguments, briefly, are: (1) identity of position; Papremis was on the Egyptian frontier, on or near the Nile (Diod. xi. 74); H. says Pelusium is ‘the entrance’ into Egypt from the east (141. 4, the story of Sethos); (2) the Coptic name of Pelusium is ‘Peremoun’, which may well be derived from Papremis; (3) πηλούσιον is a Greek adjective, and was probably the name of the settlement of the mercenaries in the territory of Papremis (cf. 165 n.). It is noticeable that H. never calls Pelusium a ‘town’.

H. says the god worshipped here was Ares (59. 3); whom he means is uncertain. Some explain ‘Ares’ as the Egyptian Anhur (Greek Ὄνουρις), the son of Ra; he stands in Ra's boat, and clears his course of snakes and hippopotami; his title was ‘foe-smiter’. More probably, however, Ares=a form of Set, i.e. Typhon (Sourdille, R. p. 188 seq.); for (1) they have a common character of violence. (2) The hippopotamus, sacred in Papremis only (c. 71), was the symbol of Typhon (Plut. I. et O. 50); of it the Greeks said τῇ μητρὶ βίᾳ μίγνυσθαι, which explains the story told by H. below. (3) Papremis was somewhere in the north-east Delta, near the Serbonian Lake (cf. iii. 5 n.).

ἐπὶ τὰ ἕτερα: i.e. opposite those in the entrance.

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