¹⁸ Each day one ox, six choice sheep and some poultry^(A) were prepared for me, and every ten days an abundant supply of wine of all kinds. In spite of all this, I never demanded the food allotted to the governor, because the demands were heavy on these people.

²² Solomon’s daily provisions^(A) were thirty cors^[a] of the finest flour and sixty cors^[b] of meal, ²³ ten head of stall-fed cattle, twenty of pasture-fed cattle and a hundred sheep and goats, as well as deer, gazelles, roebucks and choice fowl.^(B)

¹⁴ Moreover, from the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes,^(A) when I was appointed to be their governor^(B) in the land of Judah, until his thirty-second year—twelve years—neither I nor my brothers ate the food allotted to the governor. ¹⁵ But the earlier governors—those preceding me—placed a heavy burden on the people and took forty shekels^[a] of silver from them in addition to food and wine. Their assistants also lorded it over the people. But out of reverence for God^(C) I did not act like that.