Present are the remains of gates from two different periods. There is the gate complex that the Assyrians saw and the one that the Babylonians saw when they took Lachish in 587. On ascending the path, as soon as we reach level ground (still outside the city wall), we turn around to our right and see the ruin of a room. In it archaeologists found 16 ostraca , letters from 589 and 588 BC sent to "my lord Yaush," a military commander. One letter indicates that an important personage was sent to Egypt, perhaps seeking help. Another mentions a prophet but gives no name. A third letter connects with a passage in Jeremiah (34:7) indicating that Jerusalem, Lachish and Azekah were the last cities to hold out against the forces of Nebuchadnezzar. The letter reads in part: "And [my lord] should know that we are waiting for the signals from Lachish, as we are following all the instructions given by my lord. For we can no [longer] see [the signals from] Azekah." Lachish, it would seem, had a number of outposts, and one of them sent Yaush this desperate letter as the end approached (Keel, p. 903).

What are the letters doing in the gate of all places? The reason, perhaps, is that this was the "administrative center." For Lachish was hardly a city at this time. The palace remained in ruins. Large stretches of the tell were uninhabited.

We pass to the inner side of the city wall and find, on our left, guard rooms in the gate of the city that fought the Assyrians. There are symmetrical guard rooms under us, but the archaeologists have left them for future investigators. This gate is among the largest yet found in the land, but we can barely make out its dimensions today amid the vegetation.

We climb a trail southward to the rim of the tell overlooking the Assyrian assault ramp. Here the diggers discovered a Judean counter-ramp. (See the first picture.) This is where the Judahites braved the archers, throwing the torches and stones that we saw in the reliefs. The position also affords our first good look around. We can make out the smokestacks of modern Ashkelon and Ashdod to the west. To the north is Gath (Tell es-Sefi). To the east we can see Maresha and the mountain of Judah, where the road goes up to Hebron. From beneath us and eastward stretches one of the valleys that travelers would have used.

Descending from the counter-ramp into the city, we follow a trail north to the palace. Apart from David's palace (if it was that) in Jerusalem, this is the most significant ruin we know from the period of the Judean monarchy. What we see on site is a large raised platform: 77.5 meters long, 36.8 wide and today more than 11 meters high on the southwest corner. In our imaginations, we should probably add another 4 meters or so in height to approximate the original.

The earliest palace here was a 32-meter square on the north side, built in the 10th century BC (as indicated by the latest pottery found in the fill between the walls). The northwest corner of this first Judean palace was erected over part of a temple that had belonged to the city destroyed in the Great Upheaval. Below it was the palace from the city of the Hyksos period. Here then, throughout the ages, was the acropolis of Lachish.

The square palace was extended southward in the 9th century BC. Anticipating the revolt against Assyria, the inhabitants may have strengthened it in the 8th, but the only sign of this today is the long wall on the east side, added then. Fragments of many storage jars from Hezekiah's time were found in the south side. The archaeologists found a large quantity of brick that had burned in the battle.

The next building to arise on the ruins of the palace from 701 was one from the Persian period (5th-4th centuries BC). Most of what we see on the surface belonged to this, including huge square column bases.

In the 9th century BC, just north of the palace, long narrow chambers were built from east to west, resembling the storage rooms or stables that one finds from this time at Megiddo, Beersheba and elsewhere. A similar set of chambers was built off the palace's southeast corner.

 

Around the northern perimeter to the well

We take a trail descending to the tell's western rim (casting a glance back to the palace.) Looking over the edge, we can see where the moat temple was. We then follow this trail around the northern rim to the east side. In the shade of a lone jujube tree some benches are arranged. The trail leads to a point where we descend a few yards (carefully) to the opening of a well.

This was the main water source, at least from the time of Judah. (No earlier pottery was found in the well.) Like all Shephelah towns, Lachish lacked a spring. We can see a riverbed, however, below the tell. Those who dug the well knew they had to reach the ground water beneath that riverbed. This required an extraordinary depth of at least 44 meters. The well had water until the 1950s. Until 1948, it was the only water source for the families of Palestinian Al-Qubayba just below. They used to send their sons up the hill to the well. Because they wanted them to be quick about it, they told them that a goblin inhabited the jujube tree.  
 
The well presents an identical puzzle to the one at Tell Beersheva. It is high on the slope but outside the city wall (visible just northwest of it). By digging from so high a point, you would have to go that much deeper to reach groundwater – but this made sense: you wanted to keep your water source away from a besieging enemy. In that case, however, wouldn't you locate the well inside the city? Why is it outside the wall and a little down on the slope? Perhaps the well preceded the walled city. And/or perhaps the inhabitants felt that the well was high enough to be safe in any case, and they wanted it lower than the plateau, so that runoff could flow in. (See also the discussion at Tell Beersheva.)

At present (2008), the permitted trail ends here. We retrace our steps to the north side of the tell, where we find a trail that leads around the palace to the city gate. What have we missed? There are the remains of a small temple on an east-west axis, dated to about 200 BC, the Hellenistic period. And there is a large hole, 25 feet deep, which may represent an incomplete attempt, by the rebels against Assyria, to dig an internal water system like the one found at Hazor. Some think, however, that this was the quarry for building the houses of the late 8th century BC. It may also have served as quarry for the counter-ramp.

A presentation of Lachish by its most recent archaeologist, David Ussishkin, is available at the website of Tel Aviv University. It includes photographs and reconstructions.