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Bible Dictionaries
Azotus
Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament
or (Ἄζωτος)
Azotus, the Gr. form of ‘Ashdod,’ occurs often in 1 Mac. (1 Maccabees 4:15; 1 Maccabees 5:68; 1 Maccabees 10:77; 1 Maccabees 10:83 f. etc.), and once in the NT. St. Philip met the Ethiopian on ‘the way that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza,’ and, after baptizing him, ‘was found at Azotus’ (Acts 8:26; Acts 8:40). Ashdod was the most important of the Philistine cities which formed the Pentapolis. Situated midway between Joppa and Gaza-about 25 miles from each-it passed through many vicissitudes. It appears often in the historical and prophetic books of the OT, in the Assyrian records, in the Maccabaean annals, and in Josephus. Herodotus (ii. 157) says that the siege which Azotus endured before it was subdued by Psammeticus, king of Egypt, was the longest on record, lasting 29 years. Ashdod survives in the modern Esdûd, a village on the slope of a wooded artificial mound (tell)-once, no doubt, a strong fortress-about 3 miles from the sea-coast, where the traces of a harbour have been found. The ancient city lies beneath the sand-drift that now threatens to bury the mud hovels of the village, among which some remains of old stone buildings are to be seen. The wide plain to the east is exceedingly fertile.
James Strahan.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Azotus'. Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdn/a/azotus.html. 1906-1918.
