Lamentations 4:5 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

They that did feed delicately, &c.— See the note on 1 Samuel 2:8 where it has been observed that it was usual in the east to burn dried dung, and consequently to lay up heaps of it for use in their cottages. The author of the Observations thinks that this will serve to explain the expression in this verse of embracing dunghills. "This taking refuge in dunghills (says he) is not mentioned in European descriptions of the horrors of war; but if they in the east burned dung anciently, as much as they do now, and preserved a stock of it with the solicitude of these times, it will appear quite natural to complain that those who had fed delicately, were wandering without food in the ways; and they who had been covered not only with clean garments, but with robes of magnificence, were forced by the destruction of their palaces, to take up their abode in places designed for the reception of this sort of turf, and to sit down upon those heaps of dried dung." See Observations, p. 137.