Meanwhile, the Philistines had engaged Israel; and the Israelites fled at their onslaught, and were cut down on mount Gelboe as they fled.

Ever harder the Philistines pressed on the retreat of Saul and of his sons, till at last his sons, Jonathan, and Abinadab, and Melchisua had fallen,

and he himself bore the whole weight of the attack. The archers were following close on his heels, and sorely the archers wounded him.

Then Saul bade his own squire draw on him and kill him; he would not have uncircumcised foes kill him with outrage. And when the squire’s heart failed him, so that he would not obey, Saul himself caught up a sword, and fell on it.

Whereupon, seeing his master dead, the squire fell upon his own sword, and died with him.

So perished Saul, and his three sons, and his squire, and all that army of his, in one day.

And now the Israelites who lived beyond the plain, beyond Jordan, when they saw Israel routed and Saul and his sons killed, abandoned their cities and took to flight, leaving the Philistines to come in and settle there.

Next day, coming to plunder the slain, the Philistines found Saul and his three sons, where they lay on Mount Gelboe,

and they cut off Saul’s head, and stripped him of his armour, and sent these from place to place in the Philistine country, to publish the news in the temples of their gods, and among their people.

His arms they dedicated in the temple of Astaroth, and hung up his body on the walls of Bethsan.

But the folk of Jabes-Galaad came to hear of what the Philistines had done to Saul;

whereupon all their fighting men went out, marching all through the night, and took down his body and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Bethsan; reaching Jabes-Galaad, they burned them there,

and carried off their bones to burial in the wood of Jabes. And they fasted seven days to lament him.