Septuagint, << SEHP chu uh jihnt or SEHP tyu uh jihnt, >> is the name of the oldest known written translation of the Hebrew Bible, called the Old Testament in Christianity. The Septuagint is a translation from Hebrew into Greek. The name septuagint comes from a Latin word meaning seventy. According to legend, 72 Jewish scholars translated the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, known as the Pentateuch, in 72 days. The process began in Alexandria, Egypt, in the 200’s B.C. and eventually included other sections of the Bible. The translation actually took about 200 years to complete. The Septuagint has certain characteristics of style, vocabulary, and order that indicate its translators based some parts on a Hebrew text that differed from the main sources for the Hebrew Bible used today.
