Boasted … about … his many sons (5:11). According to Herodotus 1.136, the Persians regarded it as the “greatest proof of manly excellence” to be the father of many sons. He reports that each year the king would send the man with the most sons a special gift.
Gallows … seventy-five feet high (5:14). As noted in 2:23, the practice of hanging people on “gallows” in the ancient Near East generally referred to impaling victims on pikes. But in the reliefs from ancient Assyria, such pikes are usually not much larger than the people impaled on them. It is possible that Haman’s seventy-five-foot tall gallows includes the hill on which the pike stands.