26 NADAV NA’AMAN According to Neh 3,25, Palal, son of Uzai, repaired the wall from a point “opposite the buttress and the tower which projects from the Upper King’s House which was part of the Court of the Guard”. Note that the rebuilding project did not yet reach the Water Gate that led to the Gihon Spring (v. 26). The projecting tower men- tioned in v. 25 must have been a very prominent edifice, as it ap- pears in three consecutive sections of the repaired wall ― all of them built “opposite” it (minneged/‛ad neged) (vv. 25-27). The Court of Guard that is located in the king’s house is men- tioned once again in Jer 32,2b: “And Jeremiah the prophet was shut up in the Court of the Guard which was in the king of Judah’s house”. The court is frequently mentioned in the story cycle of Jer- emiah (Jer 32,8.12; 33,1; 37,21; 38,6.13.28; 39,14.15) 13. Where was the king’s house and the Court of the Guard mentioned in Jer 32,2 and Neh 3,25? To date, scholars have identified them within the royal palace located at the Temple Mount, but they could not fit this location into the description of Nehemiah’s building proj- ect. According to the latter account, the “Upper King’s House” was lo- cated south of the gate that led to the Spring of Gihon. In this light, I suggest identifying it with the residence that David constructed ac- cording to 2 Sam 5,9, which is also mentioned along the route of Ne- hemiah’s thanksgiving procession (Neh 12,37). The residence should be sought in the crest of the City of David, near the Large Stone Struc- ture unearthed by Eilat Mazar. Unlike the king’s palace on the Tem- ple Mount, which was relatively isolated, the residence built in the City of David was situated within a densely inhabited quarter of the city and accessible to people living in its vicinity. The location of the royal residence above the Stepped Stone Structure also explains the enigmatic text of 2 Kgs 12,21. The ser- vants of Jehoash, King of Judah, conspired and killed him “in the House of Millo, which goes down to Silla”14. Millo is the biblical Seasons (Qedem 19; Jerusalem 1984) 29; H.G.M. WILLIAMSON, “Nehemiah’s Walls Revisited”, PEQ 116 (1977) 82; idem, Ezra, Nehemiah (WBC 16; Waco, TX 1985) 200, 208; J. BLENKINSOPP, Ezra-Nehemiah. A Commentary (OTL; London 1989) 231-232, 237; H. ESHEL, “Jerusalem under Persian Rule: The City’s Layout and the Historic Background”, History of Jerusalem, 339 (Hebrew). 13 For the Court of the Guard, see H. MADL, “nātar, mat. ārâ”, TDOT 9, .t . 402-404, with earlier literature; G.A. HERION, “Guard, Court of the”, ABD 2 (New York 1992) 1099a. 14 For the toponym Silla, see O. THENIUS, Die Bücher der Könige erklärt