Juttah
Jut'tah (Hebrew Yutah', יוּטָה, Jos 15:55,Vulg. Jota; or Yuttah', יֻטָּה, perhaps inclined, otherwise i.q. Jotbah, Jos 21:16, Vulg. Jeta; Sept. Ι᾿εττά v.r. Ι᾿τάν and Τανύ), a Levitical city in the mountains of Judah, named in connection with Ziph, Jezreel, etc., in the neighborhood of Maon and Carmel (Jos 15:55). It was allotted to the priests (21:16), but in the catalogue of 1Ch 6:57-59, the name has escaped. Eusebius (Onomast. s.v.) calls it a large village by the name of Jettan (Ι᾿εττάν), and places it eighteen miles south of Eleutheropolis, in the district of Daromas (the south). It is doubtless the village discovered by Dr. Robinson (Researches, 2, 628), four miles south of Hebron, and still called Yutta, having the appearance of a large Mohammedan town, on a low eminence, with trees around and where the guides spoke of the existence of old foundations and former walls. Schwarz calls it Zata in his Palest. p. 106, and Seetzen Jitta on his map.
"The selection of Juttah as a city of the priests suggests the idea of its having already been a place of importance, which is seemingly confirmed by early and numerous allusions to it in the inscriptions on the Egyptian monuments. There it appears to be described under the names Tah, Tahn, and Tahn-nu, as a fortress of the Anakim near Arba or Hebron; and it is not a little remarkable that another Egyptian document, the Septuagint, expresses the word in almost the selfsame manner, Ι᾿τάν and Τανύ, (Jour. Sac. Lit. April and July, 1852, p. 73, 316, 317)" (Fairbairn, s.v.).
The "city of Juda" (Lu 1:39), whither Mary went to visit Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist (εἰς πόλιν Ι᾿ούδα), and where Zecharias therefore appears to have resided, has usually been supposed to mean Hebron; but, if the reading be correct, the proper rendering would be "to the city Judah," i.e. its capital, or Jerusalem (see Bornemann, Schol. in Luc. p. 12), notwithstanding the absence of the article (Winer's Grammat. V.T. p. 136). But, as this was not intended (see Rob. Valesius, Epist. ad Casaubon. 1613, p. 669), Reland (Palest. p. 870) has suggested a conjectural reading of "Juttah" for "Judah" (Ι᾿ουτά for Ιούδα) in the above passage of Luke, which has met with favor among critics (see Harenberg, in the Nov. Miscell. Lips. 4, 595; Paulus, Kuinol, ad loc.), although no various reading exists to justify it.
