event · E0306
Siloam Inscription כתובת השילוח
Six lines of paleo-Hebrew carved into the rock wall of Chizkiyahu's water tunnel under the City of David, at the point where the two tunneling crews — digging toward each other from opposite ends — broke through: "and on the day of the breach, the hewers struck each toward his fellow, axe against axe, and the waters flowed…" It is the engineering feat that Melachim and Divrei HaYamim credit to Chizkiyahu, who brought the Gichon's waters inside the city before Sancheriv's siege. Hacked out of the tunnel wall in 1890–91, the original has been in Istanbul ever since (Istanbul Archaeology Museums, inv. 2195 T); the Israel Museum displays a replica, and the tunnel itself can still be waded today.
I. Who
- Hebrew
- כתובת השילוח
- Also known as
- Shiloach inscription, Hezekiah's Tunnel inscription
- Era
- bible
II. When
- Traditional
- c. 3211 AM — the tunnel dug before Sancheriv's campaign, which Tanakh sets in Chizkiyahu's fourteenth year (3212 on the atlas's royal chronology)
- Civil (computed)
- 3211 AM · 550 BCE (trad.)
- Academic
- c. 700 BCE, before the Assyrian campaign of 701
- Date range
- c. 700 BCE
- Precision
- approximate
III. Where
- Places
- Jerusalem
Why it matters
Melachim closes Chizkiyahu's reign with one engineering boast: he made the pool and the conduit and brought water into the city. The conduit exists — you can walk it, knee-deep, under the City of David — and near its exit the workmen left six lines describing the moment the two crews heard each other's picks through the rock and broke through. No king is named; the workers wrote about the work. That modesty is why historians trust it, and why the verse and the tunnel and the inscription lock together: a public-works project from the eve of Sancheriv's siege, described once by Tanakh and once by the men who dug it.
V. How do we know
| Claim | Evidence | Confidence | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|
| The six-line paleo-Hebrew inscription describes the meeting of the two crews who dug the tunnel from opposite ends — each team hearing the other's picks through the rock, the moment of breakthrough "axe against axe," and the water flowing from the spring to the pool, 1,200 cubits. It was carved where the crews met, near the tunnel's Shiloach end. The text itself is anonymous; its attribution to Chizkiyahu's project rests on the verses and on the dating of the script and the tunnel.
Object and text undisputed; the note of caution is only that the inscription names no king.
|
archaeology external | ★★★★☆ | |
| Tanakh credits Chizkiyahu with the waterworks: "he made the pool and the conduit and brought the water into the city" (Melachim II 20:20), and "he stopped the upper outlet of the waters of Gichon and brought them straight down westward to the city of David" (Divrei HaYamim II 32:30) — before Sancheriv's campaign of his fourteenth year (Melachim II 18:13). | biblical | ★★★★★ | |
| The inscription was noticed in 1880 by a boy wading in the tunnel (reported through Conrad Schick), hacked out of the wall in 1890–91 — breaking in the process; the pieces were recovered — and taken to Constantinople under Ottoman antiquities law. The original is today in the Istanbul Archaeology Museums (inv. 2195 T), on permanent exhibition. The Israel Museum displays a replica — its own catalog says so plainly ("The Siloam inscription (replica)," IAA 1947-5433). Repeated Israeli efforts to obtain the original have failed: a March 2022 report that Turkey had agreed to return it was denied within days, and in September 2025 President Erdogan declared Turkey would "never" hand it over. It remains in Istanbul as of mid-2026. | external archaeology | ★★★★★ |
|
| The AM placement (c. 3211) is a schematic Mesorah Atlas reconstruction: the tunnel is set just before Sancheriv's campaign, which Tanakh dates to Chizkiyahu's fourteenth year — 3212 AM on the atlas's royal chronology (accession 3199). The academic date of c. 700 BCE laid arithmetically onto the AM scale would give roughly 3061; the two arithmetics do not merge, and the atlas places the object by its biblical synchronism. | tradition reconstruction | ★★☆☆☆ |
Referenced by: Chizkiyahu, Pool of Siloam