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Achish is a name used in the Hebrew Bible for two Philistine rulers of Gath. It may mean "angry,"[citation needed] and is perhaps only a general title of royalty, applicable to the Philistine kings. The two kings of Gath, which is identified by most scholars as Tell es-Safi, are:
In the 7th century BC royal inscription from Tel Miqne-Ekron the name Achish appears, along with four other names of the local kings of Ekron. A similar name (IKAUSU) appears as a king of Ekron in 7th century BC Assyrian inscriptions. This apparently refers to the same king of Ekron.
This appears to indicate that either the name Achish was a common name for Philistine kings, used both at Gath and Ekron, or, as Naveh has suggested, that the editor of the biblical text used a known name of a Philistine king from the end of the Iron Age (Achish of Ekron) as the name of a king(s) of Gath in narratives relating to earlier periods.
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Achish seems to have a linguistic similarity with the name Anchises (Αγχίσης) of ancient Greek mythology.[citation needed] Mount Ide, (Ίδη) or Pselorites (Ψηλορείτης) is located in Crete, and according to one theory the Philistines may originate from Crete.
In his book Pharaohs and Kings, D. Rohl suggests Achish may be an abbreviation of Akishimige, a Hurrian name meaning "Gift of the Sun God," equivalent to the name Suwardata in the Amarna Letters.
This article incorporates text from the public domain Easton's Bible Dictionary, originally published in 1897.