Family Life in Canaan and Ancient Isreal
Excerpted and reformated from the Original Electronic Text at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
Home and Family {1} Education, work and leisure were concentrated in and around the home. According to the Bible, the ideal family in Ancient Israel was large and patriarchal. The extended family or beit 'av (father's house) consisted of three generations (father, married sons, grandchildren) living together. Excavated houses from the Bronze and Iron Age are small and suggest an average family size of four to eight people. Although extended families might have occupied more than one house, high mortality rates probably kept most families from achieving the biblical ideal.
{2} One typical type of dwelling in the Iron Age was the "four-room" house. The full-scale model presented in the gallery is based on a "three-room" variant from the Museum's excavations at Tell es-Sa'idiyeh in Jordan. The house is divided into three parts, each with a distinct function.
Excavated remains of a three-room house.
UPMuseum Excavations at Tell es-Sa'idiyeh, Jordan. Photo courtesy UPMuseum Archives
Artist's reconstruction of a three room house:
1: central activity area
2: stable area
3: storage room
4: sleeping quarters
5: clay roof
Drawing by Chad Henneberry{3} A doorway entered into a white-plastered area (1), which served as a space for food processing and other household tasks. In larger houses, this area may have been a courtyard surrounded by rooms and open to the sky above. A row of pillars divided this room from a cobblestone paved area (2) to the side of the house. This space was used for stabling animals and for the storage of agricultural produce. The long broad room at the back of the house (3) was used for long-term storage. Space for sleeping and entertaining guests probably was located on the second floor (4). The second floor may have been reached by a flight of stairs or wooden ladders. The walls of the houses were built of roughly-hewn blocks of stone and the roof (5) consisted of wooden beams covered with layers of branches and smoothed down clay.
{4} This style of house is extremely common throughout the Iron Age, especially in the territory of Israel and Judah. Numerous finds from along the Mediterranean coast of Israel and in the highlands of Jordan make it clear, however, that this house type also was used in Ammon, Moab, Edom and Philistia.
Bread {5} In the Bronze and Iron Age, bread was the staple food. Since it was prepared almost every day, bread-making was one of the main activities of a household. People in Canaan and Ancient Israel consumed between 330 - 440 lbs. of wheat and barley per year. An individual typically consumed 50 - 70 % of calories from these cereals -- mostly eaten in the form of bread.
{6} The grinding of grain was done by hand, using a quern: this consisted of a fixed lower stone, called a metate, and a moveable upper stone or mano. The quern was made of basalt, a course volcanic stone, which was preferred for the process because of its rough surface and relatively light weight. The grain was ground on the course surface to break down the soft center of the kernel into flour. It was a very laborious process and had the disadvantage of producing basalt grit which got into the bread and gradually wore down the teeth.
{7} Bread was baked in small domed clay ovens, or tabun. Archaeologists have excavated ancient ovens which were usually made by encircling clay coils or from re-used pottery jars. The oven was heated on the interior using dung for fuel; flat breads were baked against the interior side walls.
{8} Grain could also be eaten as a porridge or steeped in water and fermented to make beer. The fermented liquid was poured through ceramic strainers to separate the beer from the barley sediment.
Egyptian beer jug Weaving and Textiles {9} Most families in the Bronze and Iron Age wove their own cloth and made their own clothing. Like breadmaking, this was an activity that figured prominently in the daily lives of women. In antiquity, the southern Levant was famous for the weaving of luxurious patterned and colored textiles.
{10} For average households, weaving was a means of producing simple everyday garments. Excavators at Tell es- Sa'idiyeh discovered burned wooden frames of looms and rows of clay loom weights in many houses. These looms were "warp-weighted": the threads on the long axis of the weave (the warp) were suspended vertically with weights. The passing of thread (the weft) horizontally in and out of the warp created the weave.
{11} The principal fibers used for weaving were sheep wool, goat hair, and flax - - a fibrous plant used to make linen. Before it could be formed into a thread, wool had to be washed, picked clean and combed straight. Then the fibers were spun to entwine them and draw them into a long, even strand. Usually a spindle, a weighted stick suspended in the air and spun on the thigh, was used (the use of the spindle is represented through a model in the exhibit). The spun fibers were then stretched upon the loom to weave into garments.
{12} Weaving was time consuming, but the tasks allowed for socializing, and could be taken up and put down as needed. Therefore, weaving activities could be matched to the rhythm of the house.
Animals {13} People in the Bronze and Iron Age lived in close contact with domestic animals. Animals provided food, and their care and feeding was an investment and a hedge against hard times. Sheep and goats were the principal herd animals: they are mobile, resilient in drought and provide meat, milk, wool, manure, and leather. Although cattle provide most of these same products and also can be used for plowing, they are not as well adapted to dry conditions and broken terrain.
{14} Pigs were rare in the Iron Age. Beginning at the end of the Middle Bronze Age, the raising of pigs declined steadily. Pigs were costly to feed and do not provide milk, hair or wool. The avoidance of pork probably was already a widespread cultural pattern before the dietary prohibition of Leviticus 11:7 in the Old Testament. In the Hellenistic period (333 - 63 BCE), when pork consumption once again became popular, this long-standing regional pattern also became a means of marking an ethnic division between Jews and Greeks.
{15} Iron Age houses usually included space for stabling animals. Small flocks were housed in and around the village, but large flocks had to travel considerable distances to find sufficient water and pasture. For at least part of each year, full-time shepherds were nomadic.
{15} Meat was a luxury which did not normally form part of the diet because animals could be more profitably be used to produce other commodities. Meat from goats, sheep and cattle was normally eaten at sacrificial feasts and as part of the entertainment of a special guest. Meat was also obtained from birds. The chicken may not have been introduced into the southern Levant until the later Iron Age. Seafood was rare for the Israelites as they lacked access to the Mediterranean for part of their history. A limited variety of fruits and vegetables was also eaten including dates, pomegranates, figs, grapes, olives, legumes, onions, leeks, beans and lentils. Seasonings included salt, garlic, aniseed, coriander, cumin, dill, thyme, mint, nuts and honey.
Storage {16} In Canaan and Ancient Israel, people depended on storing sufficient food, fodder and seed to sustain them from one harvest to the next, and a little beyond. In the Bronze and Iron Age, people in the southern Levant never developed the kind of centralized storage and redistribution systems common in Egypt and Mesopotamia.
{17} Families dedicated a good amount of time and floor space to storage. Ceramic storage jars or clay bins were used to store foodstuffs or liquids by sealing them to trap in carbon dioxide and thus prevent spoilage. Under the dry environment conditions of the southern Levant, it was necessary to store more than was needed between harvests. With poor harvests coming as frequently as one year in every four, farmers always had to keep a reserve of seed stock on hand.
{17} Fermentation, oil extraction and drying were all ways of converting food into more stable, and hence, storable products. Feeding harvested crops to livestock was a means of "storage on the hoof" -- the animals converted the fodder into meat or milk.
Personal Identity {18} The societies of the Bronze and Iron Age southern Levant were patriarchal and gender was an important factor in shaping the opportunities and social roles of the individual. In art and literature, women were portrayed as mothers and objects of desire, but also as warriors and priestesses. Interpreting evidence for the role of women in ancient society is difficult, since the evidence itself may be a product of the interests and priorities of men.
{19} Archaeology has revealed some information on the manner in which Canaanites and Israelites would adorn themselves. It is apparent that both women and men wore make-up and jewelry. Kohl, a black eye-paint derived from antimony, was the most common cosmetic product. Make-up was applied by means of a stick or small spoon and stored in shallow bowls. Men and women alike would scent themselves with perfumed oils.
{20} Clothing was a principal indication of status. In Egyptian art, Canaanite nobles are shown wearing elaborately patterned woven clothing.
{21} In the Iron Age, fringed garments were associated with special status. Elite clothing was often multi-layered and required fasteners. Toggle pins were used until the later Iron Age when fibulae, an ancient version of the safety pin, spread across the Near East. Both Canaanites and Israelites wore a frontlet, or headband, on the forehead. Men and women typically worked from sunrise to sundown, perhaps taking a siesta in the hottest part of the afternoon. Leisure time would be spent in storytelling, music and dance. Games involving moving pieces across a board according to the roll of dice were popular.
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