8 Francesca Stavrakopoulou ground away from the temple as an act of cultic purification would have been wholly ineffectual if the tombs of earlier kings remained in situ (27). Further weakening the support offered by Ezek 43,7-9 is the alternative interpretation of these verses as an indication of the central location of the Garden of Uzza within the palace complex next to the temple, as might be suggested by wtyb ˆg in 2 Kgs 21,18 (28). In view of these observations, it thus appears prudent to resist any appeal to Ezek 43,7-9 as evidence in favour of a relocation of the tombs of the Judahite kings. Rather than viewing a garden burial as a secondary or alternative mortuary practice, it is possible that a garden was a most appropriate location for the interment of monarchs. Indeed, alongside the references in 2 Kgs 21,18.26 to royal burials in the Garden of Uzza, the Hebrew Bible offers further glimpses of an association of gardens with death and burial. 1. Mortuary gardens in the Book of Isaiah In Isa 65,3-5 a group of worshippers are condemned for their seemingly illicit cult practices. They are described as: 3. a people who provoke me to my face continually, sacrificing in gardens (twng), and burning incense on bricks, 4. the ones who sit inside the tombs and spend the night in secluded places (29), who eat the flesh of pigs, and the broth of unclean things in their pots (30), (27) It might be suggested that the bones of all the kings were transferred to the new burial site, given the use of the formulaic phrase wytba µ[ bkçyw in 2 Kgs 21,18; however, Ezek 43,7-9 presents the temple of Ezekiel’s time as enduring continued contamination from the µhyklm yrgp. (28) So D.I. BLOCK, The Book of Ezekiel Chapters 25–48 (NICOT; Grand Rapids, MI 1998) 584, n. 52; BLOCH-SMITH, Judahite Burial Practices, 119; GRAY, I & II Kings, 710-711. (29) An Akkadian cognate occurring in Mesopotamian burial texts describes the grave as aπar nis≥irti, “the secluded place” (so G. JONKER, The Topography of Remembrance. The Dead, Tradition and Collective Memory in Mesopotamia [SHR, 68; Leiden 1995] 194). For an alternative interpretation which reads µyrwx ˆyb for µé µyrwxnb, see M. DAHOOD, “Textual Problems in Isaia”, CBQ 22 (1960) 400-409. On incubation rites, see T.J. LEWIS, Cults of the Dead in Ancient Israel and Ugarit (HSM 39; Atlanta, GA 1989) 159-160; S. ACKERMAN, Under Every Green Tree. Popular Religion in Sixth-Century Judah (HSM 46; Atlanta, GA 2001) 194-202. (30) Reading µhylkb, with 1QIsaa, Tg., Vulg.