The Septuagint (ˈsɛptuədʒɪnt), or simply "LXX", is the Koine Greek version of the Hebrew Bible, translated in stages between the 3rd and 1st centuries BC in Alexandria. It is the oldest of several ancient translations of the Hebrew Bible into the Greek language, the lingua franca of the eastern Mediterranean from the time of Alexander the Great (356-323 BC). The word septuaginta means "seventy" in Latin and derives from a tradition that seventy (or seventy-two) Jewish scholars translated the Pentateuch (Torah) from Hebrew into Greek for Ptolemy II Philadelphus, 285–246 BC.