PI-BESETH, pî-bê'seth: An Egyptian city mentioned in Ezek. xxx. 17, together with Aven (On); called by the Greeks (and the Septuagint) Boubastos, or, more rarely, Boubastis. It was situated in the Delta on the right bank of the eastern arm of the Nile. The Hebrew name represents the Egyptian Per-Baste(t), "House of Bast," the local goddess who was represented as a cat or as a woman with a feline head. The real name of the city was Bast, from which the name of the goddess was derived. Pi-beseth was the residence of the Lybian kings of the Twenty-second Dynasty, including Shishak; and in Christian times was an episcopal see-city. The extensive ruins of its temples are at Tell Basta, near the modern Zakazik.

(G. STEINDORFF.)

BIBLIOGRAPHY: The Eighth Memoir (for 1889-90) of the EGYPT EXPLORATION FUND (q.v.); the literature under LEONTOPOLIS, and part of that (on exploration and discovery) under EGYPT.

PICARDS (PICKARDS): A corruption of "Beghards" (see BEGHARDS, BEGUINES), applied as a term of reproach to the Bohemian Brethren (q.v., I., § 4).

PICK, BERNARD: Lutheran; b. at Kempen (27 m. s.s.w. of Ewen), Prussia, Dec. 19, 1842. He was educated at the universities of Breslau and Berlin, and at Union Theological Seminary, from which he was graduated in 1868. He was then pastor at New York City (1868-69), North Buffalo, N. Y. (1869-70), Syracuse, N. Y. (1870-74), Rochester, N. Y. (1874,81), Allegehany, Pa. (1881-95), Albany, N. Y. (1895-1901). Since 1905 he has occupied a pastorate in Newark, N. J. He has translated F. Delitzseh's Jewish Artisan Life in the Time of Christ (New York, 1883) and H. Cremer's Essence of Christianity (1903); has edited Luther's "Eine Feste Burg " in Nineteen Languages (New York, 1883); and has written Luther as a Hymnist (Philadelphia, 1875); Jüdischen Volksleben zur Zeit Jesu (Rochester, N. Y., 1880); Historical Sketch of the Jews since the Destruction of Jerusalem (New York, 1887); The Life of Jesus according to extra-canonical Sources (1887); The Talmud, what it is, and what it knows about Jesus and his Followers (1888); Historical Sketch of the Jews since their Return from Babylon (Chicago, 1892); Made Mecum Homileticum i. (Cleona, Pa., 1899); The Extra-canonical Life of Christ (New York, 1903); Extra-canonical New Testament Writings of the First Two Centuries (1905); Lyra Gerhardti: A Selection of Paul Gerhardt's Spiritual Songs (Burlington, Ia., 1906); Hymns and Poetry of the Eastern Church (1908); Paralipomena: Remains of Gospels and Sayings of Christ (1908); and The Apocryphal Acts (Chicago, 1909).