Succothancient site, Egypt

a Jewish autumn festival of double thanksgiving that begins on the 15th day of Tishri (in September or October), five days after Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. It is one of the three Pilgrim Festivals of the Old Testament.

The Bible refers to ḥag ha-asif (“Feast of the Ingathering,” Exodus 23:16), when grains and fruits were gathered at the harvest’s end, and to ḥag ha-sukkot (“Feast of Booths,” Leviticus 23:34), recalling the days when the Israelites lived in huts (sukkot) during their years of wandering in the wilderness after the Exodus from Egypt. The festival is characterized by the erection of huts made of branches and by the gathering of four species of plants, with prayers of thanksgiving to God for the fruitfulness of the land. As part of the celebration, a sevenfold circuit of the synagogue is made with the four plants on the seventh day of the festival, called by the special name Hoshana Rabba (“Great Hosanna”).

The eighth day is considered by some a separate festival and called Shemini Atzeret (“Eighth Day of the Solemn Assembly”). In Israel the eighth day also commemorates the completion of the annual cycle of readings from the Torah (the first five books of the Bible) and is called Simḥat Torah (“Rejoicing of the Law”). Outside Israel, Simḥat Torah is celebrated independently on the following day. See also Shemini Atzeret; Simhath Torah.

muḥāfaẓah (governorate), northeastern Nile delta, Lower Egypt. It is a square-shaped territory with a long, narrow extension northward along the Suez Canal, ending just south of Port Said. Its eastern boundary is the Suez Canal, including Great Bitter Lake (Buḥayra al-Murrah al-Kubrā), a shallow, marshy salt lake forming part of the Suez Canal. The governorate consists mainly of desert, except in the northern part.

It is traversed east–west by the Al-Ismāʿīliyyah Canal, formerly called the Sweet Water Canal, built 1858–63 from the Būlāq quarter of Cairo on the Nile to the city of Ismailia on Lake Al-Timsāḥ to provide fresh water for the thousands of workmen building the Suez Canal. A branch, commencing just west of the city, runs south along the waterway to Suez city. There is extensive irrigation along the main (east–west) section, and the area, otherwise waterless desert, produces fine truck crops. Cattle raising and fish farming have been introduced. Poor, sandy soils have hindered agricultural development on the Suez Canal branch. In the northern areas of the governorate, fruit and vegetables are raised on land receiving winter rains.

Just outside Ismailia to the west is a military base, established by the British in World War I. Enlarged and improved over the years, it was evacuated by the British in 1956 under the terms of the treaty of 1954 and is now occupied by Egyptian armed forces.

Ancient ruins have been discovered at Tall al-Maskhūṭah, about 10 miles (16 km) west of Ismailia on the Al-Ismāʿīliyyah Canal. Some scholars identify them with biblical Pithom, a site of pharaonic storehouses built by the Hebrews under Egyptian bondage (Exodus 1:11). Other scholars identify...