Hebrew word · H1449

גְּדֵרָה

ugederah

Gederah

From gader/gederah, 'a stone wall, a fenced enclosure, a sheepfold' (Numbers 32:16: 'folds for our flocks'). So the names mean something like 'the Fold' and 'the (pair of) Folds'.

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

§ Gederah = "wall"

a town of Judah in the lowland country

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Joshua 15:36

Range of meaning

From gader/gederah, 'a stone wall, a fenced enclosure, a sheepfold' (Numbers 32:16: 'folds for our flocks'). So the names mean something like 'the Fold' and 'the (pair of) Folds'.

Against the English

KJV, YLT, ESV and NASB list both as separate towns. BSB, WEB and NIV-type versions put 'Gederah (or Gederothaim)', treating the second as another name for the first.

Used elsewhere in the period

The Septuagint has 'Gederah and its enclosures', reading the second word as an ordinary noun. 1 Chronicles 4:23 mentions potters who lived 'at Netaim and Gederah' and worked for the king. Whether that is the same Gederah is uncertain.

Similar words

Where it appears

Joshua · 1

  1. Joshua 15:36 וְהַגְּדֵרָ֖ה and <the> Gederah

    Shaaraim, Adithaim, and Gederah (or Gederothaim)—fourteen cities, along with their villages.

    Here: Literally 'the walled enclosure' or 'the sheepfold', from gader, 'stone wall'. The word 'the' attached to it shows the name was still heard as an ordinary noun: 'the Pen'.

1 Chronicles · 1

  1. 1 Chronicles 4:23 וּגְדֵרָ֑ה and Gederah

    These were the potters who lived at Netaim and Gederah. They lived there in the service of the king.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.