Lachish
 
 Impregnable, a royal Canaanitish city in the Shephelah, or maritime
 plain of Palestine Jos 10:3,5 12:11 It was taken and destroyed by
 the Israelites Jos 10:31-33 It afterwards became, under Rehoboam,
 one of the strongest fortresses of Judah 2Ch 11:9 It was assaulted
 and probably taken by Sennacherib 2Ki 18:14,17 19:8 Isa 36:2 An
 account of this siege is given on some slabs found in the chambers of
 the palace of Koyunjik, and now in the British Museum. The
 inscription has been deciphered as follows:, "Sennacherib, the mighty
 king, king of the country of Assyria, sitting on the throne of
 judgment before the city of Lachish: I gave permission for its
 slaughter." 
   See NINEVEH 25735 
 Lachish has been identified with Tell-el-Hesy, where a cuneiform
 tablet has been found, containing a letter supposed to be from
 Amenophis at Amarna in reply to one of the Amarna tablets sent by
 Zimrida from Lachish. This letter is from the chief of Atim (=Etam,)
 1Ch 4:32 to the chief of Lachish, in which the writer expresses
 great alarm at the approach of marauders from the Hebron hills. "They
 have entered the land," he says, "to lay waste ...strong is he who has
 come down. He lays waste." This letter shows that "the communication
 by tablets in cuneiform script was not only usual in writing to Egypt,
 but in the internal correspondence of the country. The letter, though
 not so important in some ways as the Moabite stone and the Siloam
 text, is one of the most valuable discoveries ever made in Palestine"
 (Conder's Tell Amarna Tablets, p.  134 Excavations at Lachish are
 still going on, and among other discoveries is that of an iron
 blast-furnace, with slag and ashes, which is supposed to have existed
 B.C. 1500 If the theories of experts are correct, the use of the
 hot-air blast instead of cold air (an improvement in iron manufacture
 patented by Neilson in 1828 was known fifteen hundred years before
 Christ.
 
   See FURNACE 24398