Introduction

Within biblical studies there is little consensus between scholars on many, if not most, subjects. This lack of consensus is magnified when archaeology of the southern Levant and the archaeologists who specialize in it are included in the discussion, not to mention the baggage that each of us brings but heroically (and sometimes not so heroically) attempts to discard or ignore, such as our nationality, sex, and religious or non-religious beliefs, which further broaden the divide. This lack of consensus became even more evident as I began identifying which sites in Iron IIB–C Judah contained documented dwellings that would be part of the case study. What should have been a simple task quickly snowballed into an issue that needed clarification, even if only for my own peace of mind: there seemed to be little to no agreement on the classification or types of settlements. What one scholar or archaeologist would call a “city” another would call a “town” or “administrative center.”

As one can imagine, this soon became a problem while trying to identify and interpret data on various sites. Consequently, the quest to clarify the muddy waters of settlement classification begins with a question that bears some further discussion: with regards to settlement classification, does size matter? In other words, is the size of a settlement the determining factor in how it is classified? Are the settlement classifications suggested by Syro-Palestinian archaeologists consistent with how the authors and editors of the Hebrew Bible describe those settlements?