ASHDOD (lilt,N ; Sept. "Arwros), the Az0TUS of the Greeks and Romans, and so called in Macc. iv. 15 ; Acts viii. 40 (see also PIM. Hist. Nat. v.14; Ptolem. v. 16); a city on the summit of a grassy hill, near the Mediterranean coast, nearly mid way between Gaza and Joppa, being 18 geog. miles N. by E. from the former, and 21 S. from the latter ; and more exactly mid-way between Askelon and Ekron, being to geog. miles N. by E, from the former, and S. by W. from the latter. Ash dod was a city of the Philistines, and the chief town of one of their five states (Josh. xiii. 3; I Sam. vi. 17). It was the seat of the worship of Dagon (I Sam. v. 5; I Macc. xi. 4), before whose shrine in this city it was that the captured ark was deposited and triumphed over the idol (I Sam. v. 1-9). Ashdod was assigned to Judah ; but many centuries passed before it and the other Philistine towns were subdued [PHILISTINES]; and it appears never to have been permanently in possession of the Judahites, although it was dis mantled by Uzziah, who built towns in the territory of Ashdod (2 Chron. xxvi. 6). It is mentioned to the reproach of the Jews after their return from captivity, that they married wives of Ashdod ; the result of which was that the children of these marriages spoke a mongrel dialect, compounded of Hebrew and the speech of Ashdod (Neh. xiii. 23, 24). These facts indicate the ancient importance of Ashdod. It was indeed a place of great strength ; and being on the usual military route between Syria and Egypt, the possession of it became an object of importance in the wars between Egypt and the great northern powers. Hence it was secured by the Assyrians before invading Egypt (Isa. xx. r, sq.); and at a later date it was taken by Psammetichus, after a siege of twenty-nine years, the longest on record (Herodot. ii. 137).
The destruction of Ashdod was foretold by the prophets (Jer. xxv. 20; Amos i. 8; iii. 9; Zeph. ii. 4; Zech. ix. 6); and was accomplished by the Maccabees (a Macc. v. 68; x. 77-84; xi. 4). It is enumerated among the towns which Pompey joined to the province of Syria (Joseph_ Antiq. 4. 4, De Bell yud. i. 7. 7), and among the cities ruined in the wars, which Gabinius ordered to be rebuilt (Antiq. xiv. 5. 3). It was included in Herod's dominion, and was one of the three towns bequeathed by him to his sister Salome (Antiq. xvii. 8. 1). The evangelist Philip was found at Ashdod after he had baptized the Ethiopian eunuch on his professing his belief in Christ (Acts viii. 40). Azotus early became the seat of a bishopric; and we find a bishop of this city present at the councils of Nice, Chalcedon, A. D. 359, Selucia, and Jeru salem, A. D. 536 (Reland, Pakestina, p. 609).
Ashdod subsisted as a small unwalled town in the time of Jerome. It was in ruins when Benjamin of Tudela visited Palestine (Pin. ed. Asher, i. 79) t but we learn from William of Tyre and Vitriacus that the bishopric was revived by the Latin Christians, at least titularly, and made suffragan of Treves. Sandys (Travailes, p. 151) describes it as `a place of no reckoning;' and Zuallart (Voyage, iv. p. 132) speaks of it as an Arab village. And this seems to be its present condition, for Irby and Mangles (p. 'So) describe it as inhabited. The site is marked by ancient ruins, such as broken arches, and partly buried fragments of marble columns, there is also what appeared to these travellers to be a very ancient khan, the principal chamber of which had obviously, at some former period, been used as a Christian chapel. The place is still called Esa'nd. —.I- K.