Dung
Archimandrite Nikifor’s Biblical Encyclopedia
(Ezek. 4:12)—animal dung was dried and used as fuel in regions where wood was scarce. Ezekiel was commanded to bake bread over human excrement as a sign of the defiled food Israel would eat among the nations; after his protest God allowed cow dung instead (Ezek. 4:12-15). Refuse heaps outside Jerusalem gave the Dung Gate its name (Neh. 2:13). The “dove’s dung” sold during the siege of Samaria (2 Kings 6:25) may denote literal refuse or a cheaply valued plant product; the Hebrew expression is debated.
Rabshakeh’s obscene siege threat concerned people reduced to consuming their own waste (2 Kings 18:27), not the siege of Samaria as the source mistakenly states.