A Comparison of Two Contemporaneous Lifestyles of the Late Second Millennium B. C.

Abstract

Differences detected in late second millennium B. C. material culture excavated in the lowlands and the hill country traditionally have been attributed to two ethnic groups described in the Old Testament as "Canaanite" and "Israelite." An alternate explanation, based on a reassessment of pottery, architecture, agriculture, and "cultic artifacts," suggests that regional variation in material culture reflects geographic and economic factors rather than ethnic identity. Ethnicity is defined and explained. Based on ethnoarchaeological research in Cyprus and Jordan, differences in ancient artifacts can correspond to contemporaneous lifestyles, urban and rural. Social mobilization is presented as the process that culminated in the redistribution of the population into rural, dispersed settlements characteristic of the 14th and 13th centuries B. C.