¹⁶ Then Joab blew his trumpet. He ordered his troops to stop chasing Israel’s army. ¹⁷ Joab’s men threw Absalom into a big pit in the forest. They covered him with a large pile of rocks. While all of that was going on, all the Israelites ran back to their homes.

¹⁸ Earlier in his life Absalom had set up a pillar in the King’s Valley. He had put it up as a monument to himself. He thought, “I don’t have a son to carry on the memory of my name.” So he named the pillar after himself. It is still called Absalom’s Monument to this day.