18. The throne had six steps, with a footstool of gold, which were fastened to the throne; there were armrests on either side of the place of the seat, and two lions stood beside the armrests.
19. Twelve lions stood there, one on each side of the six steps; nothing like this had been made for any other kingdom.
20. All King Solomon’s drinking vessels were gold, and all the vessels of the House of the Forest of Lebanon were pure gold. Not one was silver, for this was accounted as nothing in the days of Solomon.
21. For the king’s ships went to Tarshish with the servants of Hiram. Once every three years the merchant ships came, bringing gold, silver, ivory, apes, and monkeys.
22. So King Solomon surpassed all the kings of the earth in riches and wisdom.
23. And all the kings of the earth sought the presence of Solomon to hear his wisdom, which God had put in his heart.
24. Each man brought his present: articles of silver and gold, garments, armor, spices, horses, and mules, at a set rate year by year.
25. Solomon had four thousand stalls for horses and chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen whom he stationed in the chariot cities and with the king at Jerusalem.
26. So he reigned over all the kings from the River to the land of the Philistines, as far as the border of Egypt.
27. The king made silver as common in Jerusalem as stones, and he made cedar trees as abundant as the sycamores which are in the lowland.
28. And they brought horses to Solomon from Egypt and from all lands.
29. Now the rest of the acts of Solomon, first and last, are they not written in the book of Nathan the prophet, in the prophecy of Ahijah the Shilonite, and in the visions of Iddo the seer concerning Jeroboam the son of Nebat?
30. Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel forty years.