고대 이스라엘 도시화에서 도시성문의 기능 연구 : 도시성문의 경제적-행정적 기능을 중심으로

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This paper demonstrates that the city gate was an elaborate structure designed both to control traffic in or out, and to facilitate the civic needs of the city life in ancient urbanism. The remains found at the city gates are in certain relationship with city gate activities, and can serve as indicators of Iron Age II urban societies and cultures. Both textual and archaeological evidence collected and analyzed in this study are fitted into the tasks of the city construction and the city gates was an essential element in urbanized city.<BR> Textual evidence from the Hebrew Bible and ancient Near Eastern texts illustrates how the city gates were utilized to fulfill their economic and administrative functions. Textual evidence shows that the city gate was used for various economic negotiations and storage of goods. Iron Age II economic activities at the city gate continued in Iron Age III, the fifth century BCE; a number of gates of Jerusalem were named after the wares of craftsmen or merchants who had traded at these gates.<BR> Archaeological evidence supports the idea of the city gate complex as a major economic and administrative locus during the Iron Age II period. Architectural complexities, installations, and artifacts clearly demonstrate that the city gates served daily matters. They provided insight into the variety of spatial activities in gate locales. Architectural features such as chambers, pillared buildings, open plazas, and storehouses were situated in convenient proximity to the city gates such that all the economic and administrative matters of the city life were easily handled and secured. The installations and artifacts found in situ at the gates and gate complexes such as seals, seal impressions, shekels, loom-weights, ostraca, basins, scales and weights, imported vessels, oil presses, shops at open plazas, and lmlk jars have shown that the city gates served economic and administrative functional roles.<BR> A city gate is not only an architectural construction that survives in the ancient sites, as an articulated architectural complex, it is a marker and window into how ancient people lived and how economic and administrative center served their needs. Thus, this study argues that based on the textual and archaeological evidence, the city gate area was the activity of the city, and archaeological remains serve as an indicator on Iron Age II urban society in ancient Israel.