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Bible Dictionaries
Kittim
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
or KITTIM (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] Chittim , which is retained by RV [Note: Revised Version.] in Malachi 1:1 Malachi 1:1; 1Ma 8:5 ) designates properly the island of Cyprus, and is to he so understood in the geographical list of the descendants of Javan (wh. see), that is, the Ionians, in Genesis 10:4 . The name is based on that of the settlement on the south-east of the island, called Kition by the Greeks, the modern Larnaka. This was the first trading post of the Phœnicians on the Mediterranean, hence it is vaguely used in Ezekiel 27:8 as the mother-city of all the maritime settlements westward. The connexion with the Ionians or Greeks is not quite clear, since these were not the first settlers on the island. There were, however, undoubtedly Greek colonists there in the 8th cent. b.c., as we learn from the inscription of the Assyrian Sargon of 720, pointing to a settlement of Ionian Cyprians in Ashdod. A use of the word, still more vague, is found in Daniel 11:30 , where it refers to the Romans, while in Numbers 24:24 (as in Malachi 1:1 Malachi 1:1; 1Ma 8:5 ) it is applied apparently to the Macedonians.
J. F. M‘Curdy.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Kittim'. Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdb/k/kittim.html. 1909.
