And David arose, and came to the place where Saul had pitched: and David beheld the place where Saul lay, and Abner the son of Ner, the captain of his host: and Saul lay in the trench, and the people pitched round about him.
Came to the place where Saul had pitched. Having obtained certain information respecting the locality of the king's encampment, he seems, accompanied by his nephew (1 Samuel 26:6), to have hid himself, perhaps disguised, in a neighbouring wood or hill, on the skirts of the royal camp toward night, and waited to approach it under covert of the darkness.
The place where Saul lay, and Abner the son of Ner. The Hebrew 'aab (H1) signifies father; but the captain of Saul's host may have been called Ab-ner in honour of some ancestor, without any reference to the meaning of the name. Another explanation has been suggested. 'In Ab-ner there are two pure Gomeric roots, and 'aab (H1) is the contrary of father; because it is expressly explained, "Abner, son of Ner, captain of David's host." This "ab" is of course the ab or ap of the Appii of Italy, and of the Cymry of Britain-son; Abner, son of strength; or in Latin, Appius Nero; and as we know that the Appii Claudii Nerones were a pure Umbrian family, we have in the center of Palestine, B.C. 1000, and in the center of Italy, B.C. at least 700, two Gomeric families of precisely the same name, derived from their common family language (Japhetic) in the most natural way conceivable. It is utterly impossible that the Jewish writer, whoever he was, of the books of Samuel, could have devised such a coincidence, or imagined its ethnological significance. He wrote down the simple fact. We know how to explain it; but this very knowledge is a confirmation of the prophetic utterance of Noah' (Genesis 9:27) ('Vindication of the Mosaic Ethnology of Europe').
Saul lay in the trench, х bama`gaal (H4570)] - in the wagon, rampart (see the note at 1 Samuel 17:20).
And the people lay round about him. Among the nomad people of the East the encampments are usually made in a circular form; the circumference is lined by the baggage and the men, while the chief's station is in the center, whether he occupied a tent or not. His spear, stuck in the ground at his bolster head, indicates his position (see Morier, 'Second Journey through Persia,' p. 115, where is a similar description of a Persian governor reposing from the fatigues of a journey, with his attendants around him). Similar was the disposition of Saul's camp. In his hasty expedition he seems to have carried no tent, but to have slept on the ground. The whole troop were sunk in sleep around him.