Message decoding : what does the inscription of Lachish 2 represent?

Abstract

It is with pleasure that I contribute this paper in honour of Anthony J. Frendo, who has been a generous source of inspiration during my academic years at my alma mater, the University of Malta. Through classes on Israelite archaeology and sessions of mind-boggling scrutiny of West Semitic script typologies, Anthony introduced me to “a group of intriguing pieces of pottery” that carry a significant link between archaeological evidence and biblical texts, specifically the book of Jeremiah. It is now an honour to discuss the philological aspects of one of these ceramic sherds as a contribution to this volume. I feel privileged to have known Anthony over these many years, and I congratulate him on a long and distinguished research career. The ceramic sherds in question constitute a corpus of 21 ostraca commonly known as the Lachish Letters. The focus of the present paper is one ostracon in particular, Lachish 2, and the aim is to analyse past discussions and hypotheses on the controversial clauses of lines 5–6 in an attempt to understand the overall message of the ostracon. Due to the limitations of this paper, I will not go into the controversy on the nature and origins of the Lachish ostraca, but will limit my discussion to a reappraisal of Lachish 2.5–6 and their problematic interpretations. [Excerpt]