49. Each person also cut his own branch and followed Abimelech. They put the branches against the inner chamber and set it on fire around the people, and all the people in the Tower of Shechem died — about 1,000 men and women.
50. Abimelech went to Thebez, camped against it, and captured it.
51. There was a strong tower inside the city, and all the men, women, and lords of the city fled there. They locked themselves in and went up to the roof of the tower.
52. When Abimelech came to attack the tower, he approached its entrance to set it on fire.
53. But a woman threw the upper portion of a millstone on Abimelech’s head and fractured his skull.
54. He quickly called his armor-bearer and said to him, “Draw your sword and kill me, or they’ll say about me, ‘A woman killed him.’ ” So his armor-bearer thrust him through, and he died.
55. When the Israelites saw that Abimelech was dead, they all went home.
56. In this way, God turned back on Abimelech the evil that he had done against his father, by killing his 70 brothers.
57. And God also returned all the evil of the men of Shechem on their heads. So the curse of Jotham son of Jerubbaal came on them.