Image Details

Four links of iron chain, each 10 cm long, lay in debris from the eighth century B.C. battle at Lachish. Found by excavator David Ussishkin at the base of the burned outer revetment wall, the chain was an unexplained piece of evidence from the battle in which the Assyrian king Sennacherib defeated the Judean defenders. Now archaeologist Yigael Yadin has proposed an explanation for the chain’s presence by referring to a relief (see photo and drawing) on the palace wall of another Assyrian king, Ashurnasirpal II (883–859 B.C.).