A recent discovery in Israel may support a biblical epic in which an angel of the Lord wiped out 185,000 Assyrian soldiers, an independent scholar claims.
Stephen Compton, an independent scholar specializing in Near Eastern archaeology, has used modern mapping techniques to discover the remains of an ancient Assyrian military camp dating to around 700 BC.
The discovery, which is also detailed in Assyrian documents, Greek historical texts and the Hebrew Bible, may provide confirmation for the biblical accounts found in 2 Kings 19:35, Isaiah 37:36-38 and 2 Chronicles 32:21.
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And that night an angel of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians one hundred and eighty-five thousand men: and when they rose early in the morning, they found them all dead.
A stone slab from the palace wall of Assyrian Emperor Sennacherib depicts his military camp, which was heavily fortified, with 24 watchtowers along the perimeter wall, each with three visible windows. (Steve Compton)
The scholars detailed their findings in the journal. Near Eastern Archaeology He then shared its historical significance with Fox News Digital.
“One of the important cities that he conquered, mentioned in the Bible and in Assyrian documents, was Lachish,” he said. “On the wall of Sennacherib’s palace there was a stone-carved relief showing the conquest of the city of Lachish and, beyond it, his military camp. His military camp was a large oval. This painting on the wall of his palace is now on the wall of the British Museum, but it has never been found before.”
Compton matched the landscape with reliefs from the palace of the Assyrian king Sennacherib and used early aerial photographs of Lachish, from before modern development, to create a virtual map pinpointing the location of the military camp.
Below: A general view of Sennacherib’s palace walls, drawn by excavator Austin Henry Layard in 1849. Above: The same view taken from an airplane in 1945, before the view was altered for modern styles. Correlating the two reveals the likely location of the remains of Sennacherib’s camp. (Steve Compton)
The oldest known aerial photograph of Jerusalem is shown at bottom left, with the Oval Citadel visible on the hill at top right. From the Library of Congress collection. (Steve Compton)
The oval shape of the Assyrian king Sennacherib’s military camp helped Compton narrow the scope of his study.
“I knew it was going to be an oval shape, and what I did was I took an image of the relief and matched it to recognizable features in the landscape and the actual landscape and superimposed the two,” he said. “I used a photograph of the landscape from World War II, right before the big changes were happening.”
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“And it was a match,” he said.
Compton said the location, position, date and name of the military camp fit into the historical context of Sennacherib’s invasion camp.
The site of Sennacherib’s Jerusalem camp, now known as Ammunition Hill. (Steve Compton)
The ruins of Sennacherib’s Lachish camp can still be seen today. (Steve Compton)
Compton said he hopes an archaeological dig team will investigate the site and provide more information.
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“We are very happy to have discovered this site and hope that archaeological excavations will be carried out soon that will give us more information about the site,” he said.
