batanun, al-, a city located some 10 miles (16 km) south of Tanta in the province of al-Minufiyyah. It was known in Coptic times as Pathanon.
Al-Batanun was the birthplace of Patriarch shenute I (858-880) and the place to which the remains of the forty-nine martyrs of Scetis were brought for a time after having been stolen from their resting place in Scetis, probably at the beginning of the seventh century. In al-Batanun the remains were kept in the church of Apa Onophrius (Zoega, 1810, pp. 95-97).
Muslim authors in the medieval period mention al-Batanun, but they give no information about Christians or churches in the town. There are today two churches in al-Batanun, one of Sarapammon, built around 1897, and one of the Virgin Mary.