As is shown by the discovery at Lachish, the second most important Judean city after Jerusalem, of seals with the inscription "lmlk Hebron" (to the king Hebron), Hebron continued to constitute an important local economic centre, given its strategic position on the crossroads between the Dead Sea to the east, Jerusalem to the north, the Negev and Egypt to the south, and the Shepelah and the coastal plain to the west. Lying along trading routes, it remained administratively and politically dependent on Jerusalem for this period.