* 2 Kings xxiii. 29; cf. 2 Chron. xxxv. 22, 23.  It is probably to this battle that Herodotus alludes when he says that Necho overcame the Syrians at Magdolos.  The identity of Magdolos and Megiddo, accepted by almost all historians, was disputed by Gutschmid, who sees in the Magdolos of Herodotus the Migdol of the Syro-Egyptian frontier, and in the engagement itself, an engagement of Necho with the Assyrians and their Philistine allies; also by Th.  Reinach, who prefers to identify Magdolos with one of the Migdols near Ascalon, and considers this combat as fought against the Assyrian army of occupation.  If the information in Herodotus were indeed borrowed from Hecatasus of Miletus, and by the latter from the inscription placed by Necho in the temple of Branchidae, it appears to me impossible to admit that Magdolos does not here represent Megiddo.

     ** The text of 2 Kings xxiii. 29 says positively that Necho
     was marching towards the Euphrates.  The name Mitanni is
     found even in Ptolemaic times.

He returned southwards, after having collected the usual tributes and posted a few garrisons at strategic points; at Biblah he held a kind of Durbar to receive the homage of the independent Phoenicians* and of the old vassals of Assyria, who, owing to the rapidity of his movements, had not been able to tender their offerings on his outward march.

* The submission of the Phoenicians to Necho is gathered from a passage in Berosus, where he says that the Egyptian army beaten at Carchemish comprised Phoenicians, besides Syrians and Arabs.

[Illustration:  378.jpg Victorious Necho]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph published in Mariette.  This scarab, now in the Gizeh Museum, is the only Egyptian monument which alludes to the victories of Necho.  Above, the king stands between Nit and Isis; below, the vanquished are stretched on the ground.

The Jews had rescued the body of their king and had brought it back in his chariot to Jerusalem; they proclaimed in his stead, not his eldest son Eliakim, but the youngest, Shallum, who adopted the name of Jehoahaz on ascending the throne.  He was a young man, twenty-three years of age, light and presumptuous of disposition, opposed to the reform movement, and had doubtless been unwise enough to display his hostile feelings towards the conqueror.  Necho summoned him to Eiblah, deposed him after a reign of three months, condemned him to prison, and replaced him by Eliakim, who changed his name to that of Jehoiakim—­“he whom Jahveh exalts;” and after laying Judah under a tribute of one hundred talents of silver and one of gold, the Egyptian monarch returned to his own country.  Certain indications lead us to believe that he was obliged to undertake other punitive expeditions.  The Philistines, probably deceived by false rumours of his defeat, revolted against him about the time