GIDGIDDONI

GIDGIDDONI

Lehite PN		General, ca. 4th c. AD (Mormon 6:13)

For the reduplication of gd, see Numbers 33:32, or Hor-hagidgad.54 A connection with GID, GIDDIANHI, GIDDONAH, and GIDGIDDONAH seems unavoidable. No further 
etymology is suggested. 

GIDGIDDONI and GIDGIDDONAH may somehow be derived from or related to biblical Gidgad/Gudgodah (Judges 20:45, Deuteronomy 10:7), and perhaps to Hor-hagidgad 
“Hollow of Gidgad” (Numbers 33:32-33), which may be the same location as Arabic Wadi Ghadhaghedh.55

On the same pattern as GIDGIDDONAH, Nibley suggests for the EGYPTIAN name dd-dḥ.wty-iw-ny + ‘nḫ, “Thoth had said: I shall live.”56 Nibley compares GIDGIDDONI to 
the 7th century BC fortified city of kipkip or kibkib, to which the successor of Piankhy fled during the ASSYRIAN invasion of EGYPT, and notes also Book of Mormon 
GIMGIM-NO.57

See GID, GIDDIANHI, GIDDONAH, GIDGIDDONAH, SIDON.

54 It is quite common for Semitic “hollow” roots, such as gd, besides exhibiting vowels, e.g., gād, to also have quadrilateral variants such as gdgd, as the above Hebrew GN 
demonstrates. Another similar example is biblical GILGAL from gl or glgl or gll. *Does the Critical Text give any variant spelling of GIDGIDDONAH?

55 J. R. Zorn in Freedman, ed., Anchor Bible Dictionary, III: 287.

56 Nibley, LID, 28 and ABM, 236.

57 LID 25.