* This follows from the very order in which the cities were
     taken in the course of this campaign.

     ** The Assyrian text gives for the name of the King of Sidon
     a shortened form Tu-baal instead of Eth-baal, paralleled by
     Lulia for Elulai.

*** Several of the early Assyriologists read Usi-muruna, and identified the city bearing this name with Samaria.  The discovery of the reading Samsi-muruna on a fragment of the time of Assur-bani-pal no longer permits of this identification, and obliges us to look for the city in Phoenicia.

Abdiliti of Arvad, Uru-malik of Byblos, Puduilu of Amnion, Chemosh-nadab of Moab, Malik-rammu of Edom, Mitinti of Ashdod, all brought their tribute in person to the Assyrian camp before Ushu:  Zedekiah of Ashkelon and Hezekiah of Judah alone persisted in their hostility.  Egypt had at length been moved by the misfortunes of her allies, and the Ethiopian troops had advanced to the seat of war, but they did not arrive in time to save Zedekiah:  Sennacherib razed to the ground all his strongholds one after another, Beth-dagon, Joppa, Bene-berak, and Hazor,* took him prisoner at Ascalon, and sent him with his family to Assyria, setting up Sharludari, son of Bukibti, in his stead.  Sennacherib then turned against Ekron, and was about to begin the siege of the city, when the long-expected Egyptians at length made their appearance.  Shabitoku did not command them in person, but he had sent his best troops—­the contingents furnished by the petty kings of the Delta, and the sheikhs of the Sinaitic peninsula, who were vassals of Egypt.  The encounter took place near Altaku,** and on this occasion again, as at Raphia, the scientific tactics of the Assyrians prevailed over the stereotyped organisation of Pharaoh’s army:  the Ethiopian generals left some of their chariots in the hands of the conqueror, and retreated with the remnants of their force beyond the Isthmus.

* These are the cities attributed to the tribes of Dan and Judah in Josh. xv. 25, 41; xix. 45.  Beth-dagon is now Bet- Dejan; Azuru is Yazur, to the south-east of Joppa; Beni- barak is Ibn-Abrak, to the north-east of the same town.

** Altaku is certainly Eltekeh of Dan (Josh. xix. 44), as was seen from the outset; the site, however, of Eltekeh cannot be fixed with any certainty.  It has been located at Bet-Lukkieh, in the mountainous country north-west of Jerusalem, but this position in no way corresponds to the requirements of the Assyrian text, according to which the battle took place on a plain large enough for the evolutions of the Egyptian chariots, and situated between the group of towns formed by Beth-dagon, Joppa, Beni-barak, and Hazor, which Sennacherib had just captured, and the cities of Ekrbn, Timnath, and Eltekeh, which he took directly after his victory:  a suitable locality must be looked for in the vicinity of Ramleh or Zernuka.