Lachish
Lachish () was a town located in the
Shephelah, or maritime plain of Palestine (
Joshua 10:3, 5; 12:11). This town was first mentioned in the
Amarna letters as
Lakisha (EA 287, 288, 328, 329, 335). The Israelites captured and destroyed Lachish for joining the league against the
Gibeonites (Josh. 10:31-33), but the territory was later assigned to the
tribe of Judah (15:39).
Under
Rehoboam, it became the second most important city of the
kingdom of Judah. In
701 BC, during the revolt of king
Hezekiah against
Assyria, it was captured by
Sennacherib despite determined resistance. The town later reverted to Judaean control, only to fall to
Nebuchadnezzar in his campaign against Judah (
586 BC).
During the 19th and early 20th centuries, Lachish was identified with
Tell el-Hesi from a cuneiform tablet found there (EA 333). The tablet is a letter from an
Egyptian official named Paapu, reporting cases of treachery involving a local kinglet,
Zimredda. Excavations at Tell el-Hesy were conducted by Petrie and Bliss for the
Palestine Exploration Fund during the years 1890 - 1892, and among other discoveries was the remains of what was identified as an iron
blast furnace, with slag and ashes, which was dated to
1500 BC. If the theories of experts are correct, the use of the hot-air blast instead of cold air was known at an extremely early age.
More recent excavations have identified
Tell ed-Duweir as Lachish beyond reasonable doubt. Excavation campaigns by
James Leslie Starkey recovered a number of
ostraca (18 in 1935, three more in 1938) from the latest occupational level immediately before the
Chaldean siege. They form the only known corpus of documents in classical
Hebrew.
Another major contribution to
Biblical archaeology from excavations at Lachish are the
LMLK seals, which were stamped on the handles of a particular form of ancient storage jar. More of these artifacts were found at this site (over 400; Ussishkin, 2004, pp. 2151-9) than any other place in
Israel (
Jerusalem remains in second place with more than 300). Most of them were collected from the surface during
Starkey's excavations, but others were found in Level 1 (
Persian and
Greek era), Level 2 (period preceding
Babylonian conquest by
Nebuchadnezzar), and Level 3 (period preceding
Assyrian conquest by
Sennacherib). It is thanks to the work of
David Ussishkin's team working at the site from 1973 - 1994 that eight of these stamped jars were restored (Ussishkin, 1983), thereby demonstrating lack of relevance between the jar volumes (which deviated as much as 5
gallons or 12
litres), and also proving their relation to the reign of Biblical king
Hezekiah.
The 1898 Reference by Bliss, contains numerous drawings, including examples of
Phoenician, etc. pottery, and items from pharaonic
Egypt, and other Mediterranean, and inland regions.
* Bliss, Frederick.
Numerous artifact drawings, also "Layer by Layer" drawings of Tell el-Hesy. Also an original attempt of the only el Amarna letter found at site,
Amarna Letters, EA 333.
A Mound of Many Cities; or Tell El Hesy Excavated, by Frederick Jones Bliss, PhD., explorer to the Fund, 2nd Edition, Revised. (The Committee of the Palestine Exploration Fund.) c 1898.
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Jewish Encyclopedia: Lachish
