Settlement and Agriculture on an Ancient Desert Frontier

Abstract

During late antiquity, large-scale settlement existed in the Negev for almost a thousand years. Comparison with desert settlements in North Africa reveals that the Negev settlement was not unique and that its antecedents were Mediterranean practices. The principal processes that caused the rise, flourishing, and decline of desert settlement are examined. SETTLEMENT in arid areas was neither common nor easily implemented until modern transportation and water-supply technologies were developed. Nonetheless, the central and southern sections of the Negev, located in the southern portion of what is now Israel, were settled for almost one thousand years, from the second century B.C. to the seventh century A.D., under the Nabateans, the Romans, and the Byzantines. The remains of towns, farmhouses, agricultural field systems, cisterns, and wells have impressed travelers and scholars since the beginning of modern research and exploration during the nineteenth century. The most prominent remains are six well-built towns: Elusa, the largest urban center in the region and perhaps its capital, Nessana, Shivta, Rehovot ba-Negev, Avdat, and Mamshit (Fig. 1). These urban centers have been studied by archaeologists, and the history of the Negev has been described mainly in terms of their findings and the few historical records (Gutwein 1981; Negev 1983, 1986). Settlement in the Negev reached its climax during the Byzantine period, from the fourth to seventh century A.D., when most of the buildings in the centers were constructed, large churches were founded, and an agricultural complex, focused chiefly on production of cereals, wine, and olive oil, flourished. The fall of the settlements came as an indirect outcome of the Arab conquest in A.D. 638. During that conquest, the Negev settlements neither were destroyed nor suffered violence. However, the conquest led to the decay of the towns and rural settlements, and they were gradually abandoned during the late seventh and early eighth centuries A.D. (Negev 1986). The settlements in the Negev and their desert agriculture are outstanding features in the history of the region. During no other period was the Negev so densely occupied and populated. The characteristics of this settlement inevitably raise several historical-geographical questions. First, was settlement unique, or was it part of a broad pattern associated with late antiquity? Second, did the Negev settlement scheme originate in the desert, or was it an example of an aspect of Mediterranean life adapted to desert conditions? Third, did the rise, flourishing, and decline of desert settlement stem from * DR. RUBIN is a lecturer in geography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel. This content downloaded from 207.46.13.128 on Wed, 07 Sep 2016 06:14:16 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms THE GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW FIG. 1-Ancient urban centers in the Negev. conditions unique to the desert or from external forces generated by colonial and imperial goals? In the balance of this article, I attempt to answer these questions. Previous research has revealed no essential similarity between settlement in the Negev and that in southern Arabia, but close parallels existed between the Negev settlement pattern and those in the North African desert fringes of Tripolitania, Mauritania, and Numidia (Fig. 2). A comparison of the characteristics of the Negev and North African settlements is the framework for addressing the large question of desert settlement and its political-geographical origins. 198 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.128 on Wed, 07 Sep 2016 06:14:16 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms ANCIENT NEGEV SETTLEMENT 199