Brittany Held
Hello, my name is Abraham, and welcome to my crib! Come on in and let me introduce you to my little
family. I live in this quaint four room
home with just my wife, Sarah, son, Jacob, and daughter, Abigail (Stager 18). You could definitely say that I am the man of
the house. We are very much a
patriarchy, and if something ever happened to me, I know my Jacob would take up
his rightful spot and replace me as head of the house (Petersen 15).
Right now we are outside in our little courtyard. This is where we let the animals go outside
and my wife likes to send the kids out here when they won’t sit still. Also Sarah enjoys cooking out here when the
weather permits it (Hardin 81).
As we go inside you will notice two broad rooms at the back
of the house and two long rooms at the front of the house. We consider our long rooms to be outside
areas. We are currently in the smallest
long room. This is where my wife does
most of the cooking. In the next long
room, you will usually find my wife on the western side of the room grinding up
cereal or preparing a meal. We also
store a large amount of food and fuel in this area. The eastern half of this long room is where
we have the indoor stable. We have a
couple of sheep, a few goats, and even a cow!
This is where I spend most of my time.
If I’m not tending to the animals, you might find me making wine or
doing a little metal work (Hardin 80).
The broad rooms are what we consider the inside of the
house. You can tell that these rooms are
our living areas because there are raised thresholds from the other rooms,
solid walls, and treated floors (Hardin 79).
In the very back downstairs broad room, you will see my wife’s weaving
tools. She and my daughter will make textiles
back here and then we are able to use them to trade. We mostly use the other room for storage of
extra food, pots, and supplies. This
room is generally a multipurpose room depending on the season (Hardin 80). The upstairs broad rooms are the main living
areas. The bedrooms are located in the upper story (Stager 16). My wife also
takes care of the children and lets them play upstairs. She won’t have them running around her
kitchen (Hardin 83)!
An interesting fact about my four room home is that it is an
adaptation of farm life in the city: the ground floor has space for food
processing, small craft production, stabling, and storage; the second floor is
where we eat, sleep, and pursue other fun activities (Faust & Bunimovitz 24).
Since we live in the city, there are clusters of homes around us. We’re just lucky that our city was planned
well and we have good neighbors (Shiloh 11).
I think that about wraps up the tour so thanks for coming to check out
my humble abode! It’s been great having
you guys here but it is time for you to get out of my house.
Works Cited
Faust, Avraham
and Shlomo Bunimovitz. “The Four Room
House: Embodying Iron Age Israelite Society.” Near Eastern Archaeology Vol. 66 No. ½ (2003): 22-31. JSTOR. Web. 31 Mar. 2013. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3210929
Hardin, James
W. “Understanding Domestic Space: An
Example from iron Age Tel Halif.” Near
Eastern Archaeology Vol. 67 No. 2 (2004): 71-83. JSTOR. Web. 31 Mar. 2013. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4132363
Karges, Dylan.
Drawing. n.d. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4132363
Petersen, David
L. "Genesis And Family Values." Journal of Biblical
Literature 124.1 (2005): 5-23. Academic Search Premier.
Web. 31 Mar. 2013. http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=7e6be798-92c3-461e-8113-88761169ac46%40sessionmgr10&vid=4&hid=12
Shiloj, Yigal. “The
Casemate Wall, the Four Room House, and Early Planning in the Israelite City.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental
Research 268 (1987): 3-15. JSTOR.
Web. 31 Mar 2013. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1356991
Stager, Lawrence
E. “The Archaeology of the Family in Ancient Israel.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 260 (1985):
1-35. JSTOR. Web. 31 Mar 2013. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1356862
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