[1] The 1885 Census of Egypt recorded Saft el-Hinna as a nahiyah in the district of Bilbeis in Sharqia Governorate; at that time, the population of the town was 664 (306 men and 358 women).

[5][1] During the late Third Intermediate Period, Per-Sopdu – called Pishaptu or Pisapti, in Akkadian, by the Neo-Assyrian invaders – was the seat of one of the four Great chiefdom of the Meshwesh, along with Mendes, Sebennytos and Busiris.

Even though the archaeological site was threatened by urban development and the expansion of crops, Naville managed to discover several monuments of pharaoh Nectanebo I of the 30th Dynasty, the perimeter walls of a temple, and other attestations dating to the Ptolemaic and Roman periods.

[10] In 1906, Flinders Petrie went to Saft el-Hinna to conduct an excavation aimed at discovering evidence of a Hebrew presence in ancient Egypt.

[12] By combining archaeological and philological evidence, it is now known that the sacred area of Per-Sopdu was divided into two parts, called Hut-nebes and Iat-nebes, which were connected by a dromos.