But all this was after Joshua had passed away. Besides crossing the Jordan and securing a footing in Mount Ephraim, Joshua had made a successful raid into those mountains in the ‘Negeb’ of Judah which had been so fatal to the first Israelitish invaders of Canaan. The destruction of Ai had excited the fears of Adoni-zedek of Jerusalem, and in the league that had been made between Gibeon and the invaders he saw danger to his own state. Gibeon lay only a few miles to the north of Jerusalem, and the Tel el-Amarna tablets have shown us that the neighbourhood of two Canaanitish cities was a quite sufficient cause of war between them. When the tablets were written, Ebed-Tob was king of Jerusalem, and his letters to the Pharaoh are filled with imploring appeals for help against his enemies. These were partly the neighbouring ‘governors,’ partly the Khabiri or ‘Confederates,’ who seem to have been of foreign origin, and who had already captured some of his cities. The situation, therefore, was very much like what it was in the later days of Adoni-zedek, the place of the Egyptian ‘governors’ being taken by Gibeon, while the Khabiri were represented by the Israelites. But Adoni-zedek had no suzerain lord in Egypt to whom he could apply for aid. He was therefore forced to turn to the Canaanitish princes around him and form a league with them against the invading hordes from the desert. Hoham of Hebron, Piram of Jarmuth, Yaphia of Lachish, and Debir of Eglon rallied to his summons, and the combined forces marched against Gibeon and besieged the town.[262] The Gibeonites at once sent messengers to Joshua, who accordingly left the camp at Gilgal and fell suddenly on the besieging army. The Canaanites were utterly routed, and fled towards Beth-horon and Makkedah, a hailstorm adding to their discomfiture. The five kings were discovered hiding in a cave at Makkedah, and dragged before Joshua, who pitilessly put them all to death. The bodies were buried in the cave and great stones laid upon its mouth, which, the compiler of the book of Joshua states, remained there unto his day (Josh. x. 27). The defeat of the Canaanite army was followed by the capture of Makkedah and Libnah, which opened the road to Lachish. The site of Lachish was rediscovered by Professor Flinders Petrie in 1890 at Tell el-Hesy, sixteen miles eastward of Gaza. The great mound that covers its ruins has been excavated partly by him, partly by Dr. Bliss, and the huge wall that surrounded it in the days of the Amorites, and before which the Israelites encamped, has been explored and measured.[263]