Discovery Box2 Kings 6:25 
Context6:25 Samaria’s food supply ran out. 1 They laid siege to it so long that 2 a donkey’s head was selling for eighty shekels of silver 3 and a quarter of a kab 4 of dove’s droppings 5 for five shekels of silver. 6
2 Kings 7:10
Context7:10 So they went and called out to the gatekeepers 7 of the city. They told them, “We entered the Syrian camp and there was no one there. We didn’t even hear a man’s voice. 8 But the horses and donkeys are still tied up, and the tents remain up.” 9
1 tn Heb “and there was a great famine in Samaria.”
2 tn Heb “and look, [they] were besieging it until.”
3 tn Heb “eighty, silver.” The unit of measurement is omitted.
4 sn A kab was a unit of dry measure, equivalent to approximately one quart.
5 tn The consonantal text (Kethib) reads, “dove dung” (חֲרֵייוֹנִים, khareyonim), while the marginal reading (Qere) has “discharge” (דִּבְיוֹנִים, divyonim). Based on evidence from Akkadian, M. Cogan and H. Tadmor (II Kings [AB], 79) suggest that “dove’s dung” was a popular name for the inedible husks of seeds.
6 tn Heb “five, silver.” The unit of measurement is omitted.
7 tn The MT has a singular form (“gatekeeper”), but the context suggests a plural. The pronoun that follows (“them”) is plural and a plural noun appears in v. 11. The Syriac Peshitta and the Targum have the plural here.
8 tn Heb “and, look, there was no man or voice of a man there.”
9 tn Heb “but the horses are tied up and the donkeys are tied up and the tents are as they were.”
