The seventeenth chapter of Samuel contains one of the best-known stories of the Bible. The battle it describes between David and Goliath took place in the foothills, the Shephelah, some fourteen miles west of Bethlehem. This would have been a day's journey away from home for young David, who was sent by his father to deliver food to his brothers at the battle front. The valley the Philistines and Israelites were fighting over led out onto the coastal plain. Later, in 2 Chronicles 11:7, Rehoboam would build a fortress at Soco in the same valley, but by the time of 2 Chronicles 28:18, the Philistines would capture it (Myers 1986b, 290).

First Samuel 17 contains several episodes reminiscent of the Iliad with its encounters between the Achaean Greeks and the Trojans. Since the Philistines came from the Aegean orb, it is logical to assume that they shared some customs with the heroes of the Iliad. Consider, for example, the armor that Goliath wore:

The Iliad describes the armor for the one-on-one combat between Paris and Menelaus in book 3, lines 330-40 (Rieu 1950, 72-73):

Note that I made two additions in brackets in the quote from 1 Samuel. Where the New Revised Standard Version reads "coat of mail," the New International Version has "coat of scale armor," similar to the Anchor Bible's "plated cuirass" or plated armor. My second addition, from the Anchor Bible, illustrates the dissimilarity between its translation and those of the New Revised Standard and New International Versions. I prefer the translation scimitar because descriptions and reliefs of battle scenes of warfare in the ancient Near East never show a javelin "slung between [the] shoulders" (see Yadin 1963, 1 and 2). In addition, the translations of 17:5-7 do not mention that Goliath carried a sword. Yet, later, in verse 45, David points out, "You come to me with sword and spear and with a javelin [read scimitar]. . . ." And lastly, note verses 50-51: "So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and with a stone, striking down the Philistine and killing him; there was no sword in David's hand. Then David ran and stood over the Philistine; he grasped his sword, drew it out of its sheath, and killed him; then he cut off his head with it."

The translation problem lies with the Hebrew word used in verse 6 -- kidon. Both the New International Version and the New Revised Standard Version translate the word "javelin," but the 1 Samuel Anchor Bible Commentary (McCarter 1980, 284, 291-93) and its supporting references suggest that a kidon was a scimitar (see also Molin 1956). This was a sword with a single-edged, curved cutting blade on its outer, convex side. The Joshua volume of the Anchor Bible series uses a similar word, sicklesword, to translate kidon in Joshua 8:18, 26. These and two references in Job 39:23 and 41:29 are the only biblical references to a kidon. Yadin, in his discussion of the Egyptian sicklesword (a khopesh, meaning the "foreleg of an animal," which it does resemble), states that it was a very common weapon used from Anatolia to Egypt and that it continued to be used into the twelfth century B.C., the period of the judges (Yadin 1963, 2:349-50; pictures in 1:172, especially 204-7, where Pharaoh Ramesses III is shown carrying one). The sicklesword was out of use by the end of the eleventh century B.C. (Boling and Wright 1982, 240).

All this suggests that 1 Samuel 17:45 should read, "You [Goliath] come to me with sword and spear and scimitar. . . ." The first weapon mentioned, the double-edged, pointed sword, was used for thrusting, and the scimitar, in contrast, was used for slashing. The Hebrew word for sword used here and in verses 39, 47, 50, and 51 but omitted in the description of Goliath in verses 5-7 is hereb, a very common word for a sword. David used the hereb, the double-edged sword, to decapitate Goliath, even though the scimitar would have worked better. It is Goliath's double-edged sword that David later picked up from Ahimelech the priest when he was fleeing from Saul in chapter 21.

The Anchor Bible suggests that the references in 17:7 and in 2 Samuel 21:19 ("the shaft of his spear was like a weaver's beam") are actually describing a device attached to the spear for slinging purposes, making the spear into a type of javelin. These are depicted in battle scenes from both Egypt and Greece and in the Iliad, where the spear is tossed first by one contestant and then the other in one-on-one combat.

Goliath's armor, for the most part, was similar to that of the protagonists in the Iliad. His cuirass, though, was probably a coat of mail or scale armor, whereas those described in the Iliad may have had two solid halves clasped together. Although it may have been Aegean in type, Goliath's armor was not similar to Philistine dress as pictured on the Egyptian reliefs at Medinet Habu. This is not necessarily an obstacle to assigning Goliath an Aegean heritage, since the biblical Philistines were a confederation of several group of Sea Peoples, one of which would have included Goliath's forebears.

The challenge shouted by the champion Goliath was typically Aegean; similar calls are found repeatedly in the Iliad. In book 3 Paris, the new husband of the lady Helen, challenged Menelaus, her former husband, to a duel that would decide once and for all who would receive her. Afterward, the others were to have made a treaty of peace. Alas, the duel did not settle the matter (neither did the duel between David and Goliath), and there would be more challenges before the Achaeans sailed for home. This type of battle, choosing representatives from each army to fight to decide an outcome without heavy loss of life, was foreign to the Israelites, but it was not foreign to the Aegean Philistines.

In the biblical story, the Philistines fled and were chased by the Israelites to Gath and the gates of Ekron to continue their battles another day: "The troops of Israel and Judah rose up with a shout and pursued the Philistines as far as Gath and the gates of Ekron, so that the wounded Philistines fell on the way from Shaaraim as far as Gath and Ekron" (1 Sam. 17:52).

Gath, Tell es-Safi, has not been excavated extensively, but the excavations at Ekron do show that Ekron was a large urban center with strong fortifications during the time depicted in 1 Samuel 17 (stratum V). In fact, the city was then at a peak according to the excavations thus far; the rich, eleventh-century finds (described earlier) include the particularly fine iron knife with an ivory handle and bronze rivets. The city had a large industrial area, including kilns and cultic areas. The bronze wheels of an incense stand and the bronze pin for a chariot wheel reflect its Aegean background. The time frame of Ekron's stratum V is the end of the Iron I period there and elsewhere in Palestine and coincides with the arrival of David, who would later become king over Israel.