LACHISH (la"kish), (Heb. 1:"."7.1?, law-kheesk; Sept. Adxis, lachis), a city in the south of Judah, in the plain between Adoraim and Azekah (Josh. x: 3, 5, 31; xv:39).
It was rebuilt and fortified by Rehoboam (2 Chron. xi :9), and seems after that time to have been regarded as one of the strongest fortresses of the kingdom of Judah, having for a time braved the assaults of the Assyrian army under Sennacherib (2 Kings xviii:i7; xix :8; 2 Chron. xxxii:9). The site is found by Petrie at Tell el Hesy, sixteen miles east by north of Gaza and eleven miles west-southwest of Beit Jibrin. Ex cavation has laid bare the wall of the ancient city, as well as later constructions believed to belong to the times of Rehoboam, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Uz ziah, Jotham, and Manasseh. The mound of Tell el-Hesy rises sixteen miles to the east of Gaza. It stands on a natural eminence about forty feet in height, on the summit of which the ruins of ten successive cities are piled sixty feet higher.
The lowest is called Amorite, and is reported to be about a quarter of a mile square. It was built on a bluff, about sixty feet above the stream which flowed .on the east, and forty feet above the level country on the north. Above the ruins of the primitive Lachish are found fresh walls raised upon those destroyed, and fresh buildings constructed of the old stones. (Palestine Expl., woo.) Professor Sayce in Higher Criticism, p. 289, says: "In the time of Amenophis IV, or Khu-n Aten, Lachish had been the seat of an Egyptian governor. More than one letter from him has been found among the cuneiform tablets of Tell Amarna, and one of the dispatches of the vas sal king of Jerusalem states that Lachish, Ashke lon, and Gezer had furnished the garrison of his city with food and oil." (See LACHISIT, EXCA VATIONS AT; LACH1SH, SIEGE OF„)