The word may be an architectural term, indicating the area into which Ehud moved as he left the king and began his escape. Some take the noun as "back", and understand "sword" (from the preceding clause) as the subject, and translate "the sword came out [of] his back". The American Standard Version says "it [the sword] came out behind" and also provides the variant, "he went out into the antechamber" (ASV version of Judges 3:22). The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges regards this wording as "based upon a guess of the Septuagint (τὴν προστάδα)", whose writers may, according to Ellicott, have been "consulting propriety", whereas many translations refer to excrement coming out of the body. The King James Version uses the euphemism of "dirt". Young's Literal Translation, more cryptically, states that "it goeth out at the fundament".[8][9]
