Hagit Nol
Defining Cities and Non-Cities through Emic
and Etic Perspectives
A Case Study from Israel/​Palestine during Early Islam
ABSTRACT Differentiating urban places from rural
is often obscure. This paper advances some clarifi-
cation based on the analysis of settlements from the
seventh to the eleventh centuries in Israel/​Palestine.
In this case study, archaeo­logical sites in central
Israel are classified into types based on their finds,
settlement types are identified through termino­logy
in texts from or about Palestine, and the results of
the two analyses are compared. The main category
for distinguishing one settlement type from another
is the amount of services it provides, with the great-
est range of services in cities. However, cities in this
study are not big, not spatially central, and not very
industrial; the only entity to answer such criteria
is the metropolis. The paper thus highlights the
importance of a contextual inquiry, a regional over-
view, and a bottom-up perspective.
KEYWORDS Site typo­logy; termino­logy; madīna;
metropolis; settlement systems; central-place theory;
Palestine; Israel; Early Islam
Archaeo­logists define cities based on their princi-
pal layout and physical characteristics or on their
assumed function (Smith 2016; 2020). Following
these general guidelines, huge ancient sites such as
Ur in present-day Iraq are recognized as cities, and
sites with a rich variety of artefacts are identified as
marketplaces and thus as regional economic centres
and cities. The central role assigned to cities does not
only relate to trade, but also to political and religious
functions reflected in specific architectural forms
(Osborne 2015). Archaeo­logical sites which yield no
such characteristics are often identified as non-cit-
ies or ‘rural’. However, historians and socio­logists
agree that the ‘city’ is a relative concept, changing in
Hagit Nol (nolgit@yahoo.com) has a Marie-Curie postdoctoral fellowship at the Centre de Recherches en Archéo­logie
et Patrimoine, the Université libre de Bruxelles, Belgium. She specializes in early Islamic archaeo­logy of the Levant.
ORCID iD: 0000-0002-4921-2851.
This is an open access article made available under a cc by-nc 4.0 International License. Journal of Urban Archaeo­logy, 4 (2021), pp. 193–220
FHG
Acknowledgements
This study is part of my PhD dissertation ‘Landscaping Early
Islam: The History of Settlement in Central Israel during the
Seventh–Eleventh Centuries through Archaeo­logy, Termino­logy,
and Narratives’ at Universität Hamburg (2019). The paper was
presented at the second ICAS-EMME at the Cyprus Institute,
Nicosia, on 12 November 2019. My thanks go to Anja Rutter for
revising the English, as well as to the audience of the presentation
and the two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments
and questions.
various contexts and through different perspectives
(e.g. Abrams 1978; Brandes 1999; Wickham 2005,
592–93). Questions of locality and temporality are
so substantial, that theoreticians of urbanity do not
agree on a single comprehensive definition. Attempts
to generalize cities under empirical criteria such as
size, growth rate, density, or long-term continuity
usually fail to include all assumed cases (Fletcher
2020). One of the challenges archaeo­logists face is
to avoid projecting the ‘realities’ of industrial cities
onto earlier sites and regions (Bettencourt and Lobo
2019; Lobo and others 2020). Roland Fletcher (2020)
therefore calls for a division between industrial and
pre-industrial cities which would provide better-re-
fined data on ancient cities and enable testing the
validity of a global comparison. In this paper, I argue
that, before conducting any comparison, archaeo­
logists must examine complete settlement systems
and reassess former interpretations and termino­
logy for settlement entities. This process will pro-
duce bottom-up definitions for ‘cities’ in diverse
contexts which could then be compared.
In landscape archaeo­logy, scholars employ math-
ematical models and central-place theory to illustrate
the regional centrality of sites and possible urban-
ization processes (e.g. Nakoinz, Bilger, and Matzig
2020). However, the clear visualization enabled by
10.1484/​J.JUA.5.126600
194 hagi t n o l
the method, together with its scientific quality, tends
to obscure its theoretical basis and hypothetical
proxies. The basic model for the theory, accord-
ing to Carol A. Smith (1976, 7–16), was published
by Johann Heinrich von Thünen in 1826. It meas-
ures the cost-effectiveness of produce being trans-
ported from and to the market centre. The subsequent
model from 1933, the central-place theory by Walter
Christaller, operates through a modular connection
between markets. The competition between them is
thought to create a hierarchy of big and small cen-
tres (Smith 1976, 7–16). A different influential theory
which also deals with the relation between cities and
their surroundings was published by the historian
Moses Finley in 1973. According to Finley, a city is a
single entity which controls its hinterland. The city
dwellers depend on the countryside farmers who
provide food, but the city owns the resources, has
the authority, and controls the conditions of pro-
duction and the access to other resources (Finley
1973, 124–25).
In contrast to these theories, archaeo­logy shows
that not every economic hub correlates with what
we imagine to be a city. In Israel, for example, small
sites identified as ‘rural’ by the excavators show a
high level of trade networks, possibly reflecting mar-
ketplaces, in both the eighth–ninth centuries (Early
Islam) and the thirteenth–fifteenth centuries (the
Mamluk period) (Gabrieli, Ben-Shlomo, and Walker
2014; Nol forthcoming). Some of the early Islamic
‘rural’ centres were adjacent to other centres at large
sites (Nol forthcoming). The ethno­logical and eth-
no-historical evidence supports this picture with evi-
dence on major economic activities performed also
outside cities — as for instance, periodical fairs (De
Ligt 1993, 99–136; Binggeli 2012). A similar problem
exists in Scandinavia and northern Germany, where
scholars of Viking Age sites struggle with the defi-
nition of central places, which are otherwise identi-
fied as ‘emporia’ or even villages (e.g. Sindbæk 2007;
Hodges 2012, 98). In short, at least one of our etic
categories for differentiating between ‘cities’ and
‘non-cities’ — i.e. the level of their economic central-
ity in regions — is questionable. In other words, the
adequacy of our termino­logy should be re-evaluated.
In research on the Middle East during the fourth
to the eleventh centuries ad, sites selected for exca-
vation are usually large settlements, monumental
settlements, and/​or settlements identified through
textual toponyms (place names). Archaeo­logists
concentrate on identifying physical evidence for
‘urban planning’ and perceive the gridiron plan as a
representation, first, of cities, and second, of ‘good
cities’ (Foote 2000; Eger 2013, 111, 119; Avni 2014,
177; Walmsley 2018). The identification of early
Islamic cities also rests on three features which are
noted in semi-contemporary chronicles and geo­
graphies — i.e. a mosque, a bath house, and a market
(Whitcomb 2007, 15; Walmsley and others 2008) —
and on traces of ‘industries’ including the produc-
tion of pottery, glass, and textiles (Walmsley 2007,
348–49; Milwright 2010, 146; Taxel 2014, 134). Area
studies of the period are not common, but when
conducted they rely on surface surveys which can
only produce limited information.1 Alternatively,
excavations of a single large site are accompanied by
surveys of its surroundings, justifying prior assump-
tions about its centrality.2 This picture is generally
different in Israel, where salvage excavations have
been conducted intensively since the 1990s on var-
ious types of sites and in various topo­graphies, but
the outcome does not change. In essence, histor-
ical cities in the Middle East are perceived as an
economic engine; the city supposedly acts as a pro-
duction centre, as the main space for exchange, and
as the chief consumer.
With a social historical perspective, I focus in
this paper on the economy of settlements, on social
and economic relations between them, and changes
over time both in the settlements and in the regional
system. In archaeo­logy, I apply high-resolution area
studies to assign to sites their unique characteristics
and regional role. In parallel, I use an emic approach,
that is, I look at the termino­logy that communities
employed to describe their own places of residence
and at the characteristics that differentiated settle-
ment types in these descriptions (e.g. Kalmring 2016;
Nol 2020a). The last analysis involves contrasting
the emic/​termino­logical and etic/​archaeo­logical
results. The first purpose of the comparison is to
get two independent storylines which might corre-
late in some cases, thus providing strong arguments.
Another aim is to test the validity of the etic inter-
pretation. Importantly, the emic data do not neces-
sarily provide a truthful presentation of reality to
which the archaeo­logical interpretation must align
(Hayden 1984). It offers an offsetting perspective.
The privilege to employ such a two-sided method
is obviously restricted to research of historical peri-
ods and text-oriented societies.
In both the first and the second method, I use
‘Big Data’ analysing tools (Gattiglia 2015, 2–6). This
involves, in the first stage, a non-selective gathering
of information through a consistent list of catego-
ries. Relatively large amounts of data are obtained
1 For, e.g., Syria, see Eger 2015. For North Africa, see Leone and
Mattingly 2004.
2 For Aqaba, see Parker and Smith 2014. For Jarash, see
Lichtenberger and others 2019, 338–39.
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 195
Figure 10.1. Excavated and
surveyed nodes in the
research area, central Israel.
Map by author.
by asking a wide research question, chrono­logically
or geo­graphically, and/​or by going into very small
detail. When assembling Big Data, quantity is pre-
ferred over quality. In archaeo­logy, that would mean
looking at detailed excavation reports along with
interim reports. For the termino­logical analysis, it
means collecting varied types of ancient texts at dif-
ferent levels of reliability. The large amount of infor-
mation allows for a clarity which samples cannot
provide through a longue-durée perspective. The
next step is to cross-reference the categories until a
pattern emerges. The goal of the method is to high-
light patterns, not to explain them. The use of mod-
els and theories, or of historical context, comes only
at that final stage.
Two research areas have been defined for this
study: one physical and the other abstract. The
abstract space is sketched from texts and principally
relates to the region regarded as ‘Palestine’ by the
third- to sixth-century administration and by ninth/​
tenth-century geo­graphers. It consists of famous top-
onyms (e.g. Ghazza, al-Ramla, Qaysāriyya) as well
as lands and places in between. The physical space
is situated between the modern municipalities of
Tel-Aviv-Jaffa, Ashdod, and Ramla in central Israel.
Archaeo­logical research in the area involves inten-
sive surveys as part of the Archaeo­logical Survey of
Israel project, rescue excavations chiefly by Israel
Antiquities Authority, and a small number of research
digs. These studies recovered up until 2014 a total
of 364 ‘nodes’ with remains dating from the seventh
to the eleventh centuries (Fig. 10.1), 124 of which
are in and around modern Ramla (34 per cent). So
far, 297 nodes (81.5 per cent) have been excavated.
All nodes have been included in this study, using
data from various levels of publications. As of 2014,
twenty excavations were published as final reports
in mono­graphs, most other excavations were pub-
lished as interim reports or limited final reports
in archaeo­logical journals (some online), and ten
excavations have never been published. Moreover,
six out of eleven survey ‘maps’ (10 × 10 km blocks)
were published online. Ongoing surveys have gen-
erally not been assessed for the present study.
Relevant interim reports do not document every
element but often record architectural features and
196 hagi t n o l
Figure 10.2.
Sites in modern Ramla,
Mazliah, and Yashresh.
Maps by author.
list special objects. Finds which are significant for
our purposes, such as floor pavements, channels,
pits, and ovens, as well as legible coins and artefacts
made of bone or metal, are noted in every report.
Surveys record visible architectural features with-
out strati­graphic contexts and rarely reveal artefacts
other than pottery and coins, thus the relevance of
their findings and possible chrono­logy is question-
able. Therefore, sites of which all nodes were only
surveyed, or remained unpublished, could seldom
provide sufficient evidence and are largely absent
from the following analysis. When limited published
information entered our results, it did not change
the established patterns, but this methodo­logical
challenge will be addressed below.
The term ‘node’ is borrowed from Social Network
Analysis. In our context it denotes small areas of
archaeo­logical investigation, such as ‘sites’ in archaeo­
logical surveys or excavations on a limited scale.
Nodes in the research area comprise two to sixty
excavation squares (5 × 5 m) and measure between 5
and 200 m in diameter. Unlike the term ‘site’, which
is a modern observation and is often imagined as a
synonym for ‘settlement’ (Thomas 1975; Dunnell
1992), ‘node’ is envisaged as empirical and more neu-
tral. Following the results of this study, ‘sites’ were
identified as any independent node or a cluster of
sequencing nodes that a) include architecture and
b) are distinct from other such clusters, often at a
distance of several kilometres. These sites may well
reflect settlements. Nodes without architecture con-
tained burials or portable artefacts and may support
the boundaries of sites when reflecting cemeteries
and dumps outside settlements.
A couple of modern municipalities, Ramla and
Ashdod, consist of a few sites. Most other sites, how-
ever, seem to correlate spatially with their modern
entity. In Ramla, mapping some of the architec-
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 197
tural elements resulted in a few possible clusters
(Fig. 10.2). The distance between the boundaries of
these clusters measures about 400 m but the divi-
sion is not hermetic. One of the maps, with all the
excavations at Ramla, suggests that the gaps between
the clusters are not methodo­logical (i.e. related to
areas which were not excavated). Mapping Ashdod
similarly results in a number of sites, among them
Ashdod-Yam and Tel Ashdod (Fig. 10.3).
The first method employed here consists of a pri-
mary typo­logy of sites that is chiefly based on the
design of their installations and on their construc-
tion techniques. ‘Installations’ in Israeli archaeo­logy
means architectural features related to manufacture
activities, to fire or water, and to any other (some-
times unidentified) techno­logy. Characteristics which
stood out are, as examples, channels, flagstone pave-
ments, and bath houses. This typo­logy was strength-
ened by the presence/​absence of additional artefacts,
such as iron objects, and by other attributes, such
as the proximity to specific routes. In the attempt
to avoid functional titles that limit the interpreta-
tion (Hodder and Hutson 2003, 171), the established
site types were named as neutrally as possible at this
stage, from type 1 to type 4.
Figure 10.3. Sites in and around
modern Ashdod. Maps by author.
In parallel with the archaeo­logical analysis, the
termino­logical examination resulted in a clear set
of five settlement types. This set of types was used
for a long period by various communities — com-
munities, speaking different languages. Most sig-
nificantly, there is an evident confusion between
the functions of ‘city’ and ‘metropolis’, as they are
frequently described with similar termino­logy in
ancient sources. In fact, it is mostly the metropo-
lis that is mentioned in the studied texts. However,
I believe that the metropolis cannot be defined as a
settlement type of its own — it belongs within the
definition of a city. Non-cities are scarcely noted but
comprise a variety of settlement types (‘town’, ‘vil-
lage’, ‘monastery’, ‘fortress’). Toponyms were seem-
ingly defined based on the scope of their services
and, possibly, their relation to trade.
The case study does not show a complete corre-
lation between termino­logy and archaeo­logical site
typo­logy. For example, the settlement types ‘mon-
astery’ and ‘village’ cannot be differentiated in our
archaeo­logical evidence. In addition, one site type
with an industrial character could only be associated
with a settlement type which appeared in later texts.
This might mean that my etic definition was not a
198 hagi t n o l
Figure 10.4. Bone figurines. Adapted by author and Ron Haran from
1. Ramla, node 99 (Segal 1996, fig. 143), 2. Fustat (Scanlon 1968, pl. 4.4b),
3. Nessana (Colt 1962, pl. 21.6), 4. Ramla, node 96 (Kletter 2005, 89, fig. 24.1),
5. Azor, node 166 (ʿAd, Golani and Segal 2014, fig. 8).
perfect fit. Nevertheless, the comparison highlights
important observations for our context: a) it points
to the nuanced differences between ‘town’ and ‘city’,
b) it demonstrates the relatively small size of cities,
and c) it indicates the possible layout of a metropo-
lis — as a cluster of cities, towns, and villages. Most
importantly, it becomes clear that the dichotomy
established by modern scholars between the most
important site (which I would call ‘metropolis’) and
all other settlement types unjustifiably cements the
latter’s inferior status. The more subtle definitions
for settlement/​site types, proposed in this article,
enable the observation of the rich variety of places,
and it allows us to better comprehend their econ-
omy and social life.
Archaeo­logical Sites: Data and Typo­logy
Certain features, artefacts, and characteristics differ-
entiate sites and assist in their classification. Elements
which emerged as significant are water installations,
fire installations, bath houses, presses, channels, flag-
stone pavements, and copper coins. The typo­logy is
not perfect, first because several small sites provided
too little information to allow for their classification
(e.g. Nesher Quarries). Second, it lacks a temporal
distinction and relies on ‘essential’ and unhistorical
characteristics of sites. This subject will be dealt with
in the discussion. In this section, I introduce relevant
portable artefacts, relevant installations, and other
architectural elements. Next, the initial typo­logy of
sites will be discussed, followed by additional char-
acteristics which correlate with that typo­logy and
with an interpretation of site types.
Portable Finds
Objects from excavations in the research area are
made of clay, glass, stone, metal, shell, and animal
bone. They additionally include the waste or raw
materials of possible crafts (pottery, glass, and met-
als). The following artefacts are recurrent and can
be detected by the naked eye, excluding most types
of pottery and glass. All the common portable arte-
facts were unearthed at Ramla but other key sites
were observed, including Ashdod-Yam, Lod, Tell
Qasile, and Tel Ashdod. Most finds are also known
from famous sites in the neighbouring regions, such
as Fusṭāṭ (Fustat), Ḥamā (Hama), and Caesarea.
These contexts do not reflect the site character as
possible production sites, marketplaces, or consump-
tion loci at face value, and their role is investigated
elsewhere. Many artefacts cannot be dated with any
certainty thus their date will be mentioned only in
passing. Likewise, their functions will be suggested
but should be considered tentative.
Finds made of bone or ivory can be found in small
numbers on many of the research sites. The distinc-
tion between the two materials is not always clear
and therefore both will be grouped together. More
common objects comprise figurines, beads, combs,
decorated sticks or pins, and game pieces. The bone
figurines, the so-called ‘Coptic dolls’, are 10 cm long
(Fig. 10.4). They are interpreted as toys or as being fer-
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 199
tility-related, and some were found in burials (Golan
2002; Ayalon 2005, 80), yet two pierced specimens
imply they were jewellery or amulets (Kubiak and
Scanlon 1973, pl. 17.7). At Fustat, figurines were dated
to ad 800 (Scanlon 1968, pl. 4) but can be attributed
more widely to the ninth–tenth centuries, while the
abstract ones (Fig. 10.4, nos 4–5) might even be of
the tenth–twelfth centuries (Ayalon 2005, 80, 260–67,
figs 31–34). Specimens were found also in al-Mina,
Hama, Caesarea, Nessana, and Jerusalem (Lane 1938,
fig. 14.D; Colt 1962, pl. 21; Oldenburg 1969; Ayalon
2005, 260–67; Shatil forthcoming). In the research
area, six figurines were found, one of them unearthed
in a young female burial at Ramla (Golan 2002).
Grinding, pounding, and pressing objects are
relatively rare in our region. The group includes flat
and round millstones of the ‘rotary querns’ type,
25–45 cm in diameter. Such millstones are known
from a northern site in Israel, Tel Yoqne’am, from the
tenth century (Williams-Thorpe and Thorpe 1993,
270). The examples in the region are made mainly
of basalt but also of beach-rock, and one specimen
is made of marble. Both basalt and beach-rock spec-
imens can be found at, among other sites, Ramla.
Rotary querns are attributed to grain milling.
A much more common object type is handles of
heavy jars which bear a round stamp with a symbol
or a text. Based on the inscriptions and on petro­
graphic examinations, it has been argued convinc-
ingly that these jars/​handles derive from the site and
surroundings of Nabi Samwil, 8 km north-west of
the old city of Jerusalem (Magen and Dadon 1999;
Gascoigne and Pyke 2011; Amitai-Preiss, Cohen-
Weinberger, and Har-Even 2017). Up till now, the
largest corpus has been found in Ramat Rahel (4 km
south of Jerusalem) and allows for various observa-
tions about style and technique (Taxel and Amitai-
Preiss 2016). Scholars suggest different purposes for
the inscriptions: a potter’s mark, a blessing/​symbol
of success for the potter or the jar owner, or admin-
istrative control of some sort over the jars or their
content (Taxel and Amitai-Preiss 2016; CIAP iii,
123–24, 132–33; De Vincenz 2004). In the research
area, the spatial distribution of the handles in Ramla,
Jaffa, and Ashdod-Yam suggests a link to export.
The small number of reported metal objects
includes a variety of finds, among them bowls, work-
ing tools, jewellery, knife blades, nails, coins, and
weights. The main metals in our corpus are copper
alloys and iron, but also some lead has been reported.
Without conducting isotopic analyses, the source
of these metals is obscure, and one can only offer
a hypothetical map of potential mines (Allan 1979,
35; Morony 2019). Iron was found mostly as knife
blades and nails, whereas lead could be used in pipes,
weights, or inlays, but neither has as yet been stud-
ied in detail. Most coins are made of copper alloys
and were found in very limited numbers at almost
every site. The coins can be dated to the Umayyad
and the early Abbasid periods until the mid-ninth
century, which correlates with other sites in the
Islamicate world (Heidemann 2010, 660; 2011, 55).
Architecture: Installations and Pavements
Installations are abundant in the research area. Often,
excavators name them according to their possible
function, e.g. kilns or wine presses, but such defini-
tions have been avoided here. Rather, I have made
a conscious effort to describe and classify instal-
lations according to their form, size, and archaeo­
logical contexts and to label them as neutrally as pos-
sible. Exceptions were bath houses and deep wells,
for which I agree to assume a clear function. Since
I present here the research results, the interpreted
function of the installations is also being provided.
Built fire installations could be divided into four
types based on their construction methods, size,
and in a second step, on their spatial context (Nol
2020b). I consider three of them to have a craft-re-
lated industrial function. The ‘Big-Built fire instal-
lation’ (BB), usually termed a ‘kiln’, is round or oval
and dug into the ground, measures 2–3 m in inter-
nal diameter, is frequently built of mud brick, and
can have an internal pillar which likely carried a
second floor. In our region, this type can be found
physically surrounded by pottery waste, including
ash and deformed vessels, or adjacent to such waste.
It can indeed be determined that it was the main
installation for firing pottery, but not exclusively
so. The ‘Medium-Lined fire installation’ (ML) is
round, 1–1.5 m in internal diameter, partly dug into
the ground, and built or lined with mud. It is named
in literature either ‘kiln’ or ṭabūn. In one of the subre-
gions this type has an air-tube made of two or three
long jars and is argued to have functioned as a glass
kiln (Bouchenino 2007, 122; Kogan-Zehavi 2008, 83,
figs 6–7; Feldstein and Shmueli 2011, figs 3–4). In
the research area, most nodes with that type include
walls, often built of fieldstone, and/​or channels. In
addition, half of the nodes yielded glass-production
remains, and a third has pottery waste. I support its
interpretation as a glass kiln, but in a subregion where
it was the sole type of fire installation, it might have
had multiple uses.
The ‘Small-Lined fire installation’ (SL) is known
in the literature as ṭabūn and is usually uncritically
associated with domestic baking (Ebeling and Rogel
2015). It is rounded and lined with mud, built on
200 hagi t n o l
Figure 10.5. Sketch of subterranean installations. 1. sunken jar, 2. bell-shaped pit,
3. barrel-shaped vault installation. Drawing by author and Ron Haran.
floors, with an internal diameter is of 40–80 cm,
and its remains vary between 0.3 and 1 m in height.
Its contextual examination shows that it is almost
always adjacent to walls, sometimes in a corner.
According to its spatial context, these installations
can be further divided into types: SL type 1, which
relates to channels, animal bones, and copper-al-
loy artefacts, in fourteen nodes; and the obverse SL
type 2, with nine nodes. Small-Lined fire installa-
tion type 2 was found clustered in five nodes (with
a total of two to four SL), in six nodes designated
refuse pits had been dug, and in three of the nodes
the remains of glass production were found. While
SL type 1 might have indeed been used for baking
(although probably not for domestic purposes), SL
type 2 is connected to the industrial manufacture of
other perishable products, perhaps soap (Nol 2020b).
The most abundant group of installations is
related to water and/​or storage. It includes wells,
open and covered channels, sunken jars, and addi-
tional subterranean installations. The wells, as known
from all over the world, include a shaft dug into
the soil until it fetches groundwater, usually lined
with stone, bricks, terracotta, or wood. The research
area is abundant with wells, but they are frequently
undated, or dated to earlier periods. The limited
information on them refers mainly to semi-distinct
similarities, including lining with ashlar stones, sizes
of 1.1–1.5 m in external diameter, and an adjacent sys-
tem of channels and of square containers (‘pools’).
Next, the sketchy examples of channels show a high
diversity in material and building techniques, in
their width, and in their height. Principally, they
are either very shallow or higher and built of stones,
then sometimes covered by additional stones and/​
or are subterranean.
Two types of additional subterranean installations
are relevant to our discussion (Fig. 10.5). The first is
the so-called ‘bell-shaped pit’. It is a dug container
of a cylindrical form and a domed ceiling, lined with
fieldstones or small carved stones, and plastered. It
is interpreted as a fresh-water container. Another
type is the ‘Barrel-Shaped Vault installation’ (BSV),
which is rectangular, with a barrel-shaped vaulted
ceiling made of gravel and mortar. It has two main
variations, one plastered and the other not. Similar
installations from Caesarea and Acre from the late
tenth century, paved with mosaic or stone slabs, have
been interpreted as storage for dry goods (Avni 2014,
51). Alternatively, the un-plastered variation could
also have been a cesspit (e.g. Avni and others 2008).
Another installation consists of intact jars buried in
the ground, which measure a maximum of 70 cm in
height and 60 cm in diameter. The function of simi-
lar installations is suggested to be the storage of dry
or liquid goods (Billig 2005; Sion 2009; Toueg and
Arnon 2011). Inside Ramla, a correlation was found
between sunken jars, bell pits, and specific areas
which were later interpreted as domestic.
Another group of installations is composed of
large open containers and mosaic pavements (OCMP,
Fig. 10.6). These installations are often interpreted
as wine presses, but their diversity suggests a wider
variety of purposes. Whereas the different types of
this group of installations can be assigned to spe-
cific periods (with OCMP type 2 as the earliest),
and two of them can be observed in specific subre-
gions, three types seem to operate simultaneously
and at the same sites during the ninth–tenth cen-
turies. Clearly, all these types enabled the treading
of grapes and the flow of the juice into contain-
ers. However, besides their varied form, four ele-
ments differentiate the later types and might have
a functional role: the number of external cells, the
number of containers, the presence of a settling pit,
and the presence of the ‘holed stone’. The multiple
cells of OCMP types 4 and 5, for example, can be
explained by various instances of economic and/​or
labour organization. Most important is the lack of
some elements in OCMP type 5 (i.e. a settling pit,
a holed stone, and wide containers), which should
have enabled the fermentation of the juice. In short,
most types can be interpreted as wine presses, but
OCMP type 5 was a juice press which excluded the
fermentation processes.
The bath house is a complex installation which
combines water, fire, and open containers. Only little
attention is given to baths of the Byzantine–Umayyad
period in the Levant, and even less to those of the
ninth–twelfth centuries (e.g. Boussac and others
2014). It can be suggested that the ‘lack of evidence’
for early Islamic bath houses results, initially, from
their long continuity, sometimes spanning periods
of 400–500 years (Amitai-Preiss 1997; Blanke and
others 2007, 179, 182; Charpentier 2014). Another
possible reason is the gradual physical transforma-
tion of baths between the fourth and the sixteenth
centuries, which resulted in the absence of indica-
tive features such as the hypocaust (Fournet 2012a,
332, fig. 2). In the research area, ten bath houses have
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 2 01
Figure 10.6. Sketch of installations composed of open containers and mosaic pavements. Drawing by author and Ron Haran.
been identified, some by their hypocaust and oth-
ers by bathtubs and pipes (e.g. Ashdod-Yam), while
the identification of some has not been specified.
Another architectural element that proved to be
significant is flagstone pavements. Pavement materials
and techniques in general are diverse in our context,
commonly using plaster, chalk with gravel, or white
raw mosaic. Much less frequent are floors made of
mosaic with a polychrome pattern or an inscription,
of clay bricks, or of flagstones. Whereas most tech-
niques provide no correlation, polychrome mosaics
and flagstone pavements can be assigned to specific
periods, mosaics date to the seventh century and flag-
stone pavements date to the ninth–tenth centuries
(Nol 2019). The flagstone pavements in Ramla are
concentrated in three separate areas, they correlate
with specific installations and artefacts, and they are
distinct from the dwelling areas of the bell pits and
sunken jars. I interpret them as reflecting industrial
areas and/​or marketplaces (Nol 2020b, 54).
Two architectural elements or sorts of struc-
tures which are absent from our typo­logy are reli-
gious structures and fortifications. They should be
discussed, however, as they are sometimes assumed
in the literature to represent specific settlement
types. Fortifications, including sizable walls, gates,
and/​or towers, have been identified on two coastal
sites, Ashdod-Yam and Yavne-Yam. Both are square
structures, which fit in well with monumental con-
structions of the period (see, e.g. Genequand 2006;
Walmsley 2007, 99–105; Avni 2014, 202–03). The
structure at Yavne-Yam is believed to have been
built in the mid-seventh or early eighth century,
but the excavation has remained unpublished so far
(Fischer and Taxel 2014, 215). The fortified structure
of Ashdod-Yam is 40 × 60 m, with two parallel gates,
and can be dated only generally to the eighth–twelfth
centuries (Nahlieli 2008). A tenth- or eleventh-cen-
tury mosque has been found at Ramla, south-west
of its centre.3 Another mosque, as yet undated, has
been discovered inside the fortified structure of
3 For its debated date, see Nol 2019.
Ashdod-Yam. Churches have been noted scarcely,
and their establishment is dated to an earlier period.
They include a church on the Nesher Quarries site
near Ramla dated to the fourth–seventh centuries
(Kol-Yaʿakov 2000; Zelinger and Di Segni 2006), a
Samaritan house of prayer at Tell Qasile, dated to the
sixth–seventh centuries (Kaplan 1978), one church
from ad 511 at Gan Yavne (Sion and others 2010; Di
Segni 2012), and a Byzantine church in Hazor-Ashdod
(Barda and Zbenovich 2012, site 70; Ovadiah 1970,
22). In short, the examples of fortified sites and of
sanctuaries are very limited in number. As we shall
see, they do not correlate with the site typo­logy.
Typo­logy of Sites
Early in the investigation it became evident that bath
houses are extremely rare in the research area, and
wine presses are equally uncommon. Another obser-
vation indicates that flagstone pavements and fire
installations stand in contrast to wells, subterranean
installations, and channels. Four types of sites have
tentatively been classified according to features they
possessed or lacked. The maps (Fig. 10.7) illustrate
the percentage of these features on sites according to
general categories (fire installations, grape presses,
bath houses, pits or wells, channels, and flagstone
pavements). This typo­logy proved sustainable after
correlating it with the presence or absence of addi-
tional finds (objects made of iron, rotary querns, and
craft wastes). Site types were then mapped, and spa-
tial patterns could be observed regarding their loca-
tion, the distance between sites of the same group,
the relation between types, and their relation to
topo­graphy and natural water sources. These com-
parisons supported the typo­logy once more.
The first group (site type 1, Table 10.1) comprises
sites that answer all or almost all of the criteria. These
include fire installations (BB, ML, or SL2), water
installations (wells, bell-shaped pits, or plastered
BSV), bath houses, grape presses, channels, flagstone
pavements, and copper coins. The sites that answer
all of these characteristics are Mazliah, Lod, and Tell
202 hagi t n o l

Figure 10.7. Sites in the research area and the concentration rate of their features. Maps by author.

Table 10.1. The main characteristics of type 1 sites.

Fire Bath Water Flagstone

Site Presses Channels Coins Waste
installations houses installations pavements
Mazliah BB, ML juice yes BSV, bell yes yes yes pottery, glass, metal
Lod SL2 wine yes BSV yes yes yes pottery
Azor BB, ML, SL2 yes BSV yes yes yes glass
Tell Qasile BB wine yes well yes yes yes metal
Jaffa BB juice, wine? yes well yes yes metal
Bet Dagan SL2 juice, wine well yes yes yes

Table 10.2. The main characteristics of type 2 sites.

Fire Bath Water Flagstone

Site Presses Channels Coins Waste
installations houses installations pavements
Ramla, Centre BB, ML well, BSV, bell yes yes yes pottery, glass, metal
Ramla, Stadium BB, SL2 bell yes yes yes pottery
Na’an (South) SL2 juice yes yes yes pottery, glass
Kafr Jinnis yes yes yes metal
Tel Yavne BB, ML yes yes yes pottery, glass
Khirbat Dayrān ML wine yes yes yes metal
Horvat Hermas BB, ML yes yes pottery, glass
Ashdod-Yam yes well, BSV yes yes yes
Gan Yavne BB yes BSV yes yes
Holot Yavne well yes pottery, metal
Tel Ashdod ML well, BSV yes yes pottery, glass
Ganne Tal ML, SL2 wine yes glass
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 2 03

Qasile. The group also includes Jaffa, Azor, and Bet

Dagan, which lack a flagstone pavement, a press, or a Figure 10.8. Spatial
bath house, respectively. The map shows that all six distribution of type
sites are located in the northern part of the region, 1 sites in relation to
with 4–8 km distance between them (Fig. 10.8). It water streams.
also indicates that all sites are on the coast or adjacent Map by author.
to the Ayalon watercourse. We might assume a road
between these sites. The next category (site type 2,
Table 10.2) is for sites that comprise fire installations
and/​or flagstones as well as channels and/​or water
installations. It includes two sites in Ramla and ten
sites elsewhere. Only one site in the group, Holot
Yavne, lacks channels altogether. A map that sketches
the spatial distribution of this type (Fig. 10.9) demon-
strates its spread from the centre of the research area
toward the south. The map also indicates its spatial
division from site type 3. One site, Yad Binyamin,
with only a bath house and flagstone pavement,
could perhaps fit this type but was excluded as the
evidence was considered insufficient.

Figure 10.9. Spatial

distribution of sites
of types 2, 3, and 4.
Maps by author.

The six sites of type 3 contain fire installations
and may have a flagstone pavement but show no
channels or any other water installation (Table 10.3).
The table indicates that these sites comprise no bath
houses or coins. Moreover, their fire installations
are limited to one type each, either a BB or an ML.
The spatial distribution of type 3 sites is limited to
the central and northern parts of the research area,
whereas at Ramla, this type could not be identi-
fied. Most sites belong to the last group, site type 4
(Table 10.4), with four sites inside Ramla and four-
teen beyond. In contrast to the former group, these
sites have no fire installations and no flagstone pave-
ment, but they do possess channels and/​or other
water installations. The site of Ben-Gurion Airport
is an exception, having a wine press and no water
installations, but it was added to the group due to the
absence of other characteristics and to the presence
2 04 hagi t n o l

Table 10.3. The main characteristics of type 3 sites. * = site only surveyed or unpublished.

Fire Bath Water Flagstone

Site Presses Channels Coins Waste
installations houses installations pavements
Or Yehuda BB yes pottery, metal
Ramat Gan BB wine yes pottery, metal?
Hadar Yosef* BB
Yad Eli’ezer ML pottery
Weizmann Institute ML yes pottery
Kefar Gabirol ML

Table 10.4. The main characteristics of type 4 sites. * = site only surveyed or unpublished.

Fire Bath Water Flagstone

Site Presses Channels Coins Waste
installations houses installations pavements
Ramla, Vilna bell yes pottery, glass
Ramla, Ofer Park yes yes pottery, glass, metal
Ramla, Ma’asiyahu yes yes
Ramla, Haqal BSV yes yes
Na’an (North) yes yes
Khirbat al-Ẓāhiriyya BSV yes yes
Ben-Gurion Airport wine yes
Ramat Hahayal well glass, metal
Al-Khayriyya* well
Nes Ziyyona well yes yes
Khirbat al-ʿAṣfūra yes yes pottery
Khirbat Ḥabra* well
Rishon Leziyyon wine yes yes
Yavne-Yam yes well yes yes
Hazor Ashdod* well, BSV
Sede Uzziyyahu* well
Horvat Zerifin bell, BSV? yes pottery, glass
Ashdod (node 327) bell/​dome

of coins. Unlike the three former types, this group
is distributed all over the region. Most type 4 sites
are at least 4 km from each other. Four sites out of
the eighteen of type 4 (22 per cent) and one out of
the six in type 3 (17 per cent) were surveyed, exca-
vated only in soundings, or have remained unpub-
lished. In other words, the characterization of these
types might have been influenced by an imbalance in
research data. However, the relative number of exca-
vated sites of these types, and in type 4 their total
number, are sufficient to indicate their characteristics.
Additional attributes correlate with the site types
and imply their nature. A comparison between the
craft wastes of each site type (Tables 10.5–10.8) points
to very little waste but from varied crafts on type 1
sites, in contrast to intensive industry on type 2 sites.
Type 3 sites contained pottery waste and metal but
no glass waste. Only five sites of type 4 included
waste, but at these five sites it was from a variety of
crafts. Rotary querns and iron remains could not be
found on type 1 sites, with the exception of Mazliah,
but have been found on sites of the other three types
(Fig. 10.10). A correlation has been detected between
type 1 and 2 sites and artefacts made of bone and/​or
stamped handles of big jars (Fig. 10.11).
In summary, the characteristics of type 1 sites
are very distinct and make their interpretation rela-
tively simple. These six sites offered all the services
available at the time (water, fire, bath, agriculture,
market) and two of the more uncommon portable
artefacts (jars with stamped handles and objects made
of bone). These sites are located on a central route,
d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 2 05

Figure 10.10. Iron and

rotary querns on site
types 2, 3, and 4.
Maps by author.

Figure 10.11. Bone

artefacts and
stamped jar handles
at site types 1 and 2.
Maps by author.
206 hagi t n o l
between Ramla and the coast. It can be presumed
that the type constitutes settlements which benefited
from dynamic trade. The limited waste from crafts
at the sites (except for Mazliah) could mean that
most artefacts were exchanged but not produced in
the domains of these sites. The clear absence of iron
tools and rotary querns might reflect the absence of
large-scale agriculture in their economy.
Sites of type 2 seem, at a superficial glance, only
slightly different from sites of type 1, comprising
many of the same installations or services and even
the same rare artefacts. However, their variation is
significant, starting with the distribution of sites,
which seems random, the abundance of fire instal-
lations along with craft waste and rotary querns, and
the limited number of bath houses and presses. Their
function, like type 1 sites, must revolve around trade.
A spatial support for this function is the absence of
these sites from the domain of type 1 sites. Unlike
type 1, however, this group is more related to what
I interpret as industrial and agricultural production.
Sites of types 3 and 4 constitute opposites. Type 4
shows very few installations besides channels, wells,
and cisterns, which can mean that its main source
of income was agriculture. In addition, these sites
exclude flagstone pavements, which implies scarce
trade. Nevertheless, a number of these sites included
craft waste or a wine press, indicating some level of
production. Some also yielded coins, evidence that
reflects a sort of exchange. Sites of type 3 all include
fire installations, while on only some of them, a flag-
stone pavement and/​or pottery waste was found.
They comprise no water installations, bath houses,
or wine presses. The essence of these sites revolves
around the production of pottery and perhaps other
produce, as some sites had rotary querns or metal
waste. The absence of channels suggests these to be
the only sites not involved in agriculture.
Termino­logy of Settlement Types
in Palestine
The termino­logy of settlements discussed in this
paper was examined through diverse media, com-
prising chronicles, geo­graphies, and documentary
evidence written by Muslims and others. Texts in
Arabic, Hebrew, Palestinian Aramaic, and Greek
were assessed. The texts were divided into four
groups according to media and/​or the religion of
their authors: 1) one list of church records from the
ninth or tenth century; 2) various documents written
by Jews between the eighth and the eleventh centu-
ries; 3) three geo­graphies written in Arabic between
the late ninth and the late tenth centuries; 4) the doc-
umentary evidence comprising papyri, inscriptions,
and seals from Israel/​Palestine in the seventh–elev-
enth centuries. The texts were chosen for their rela-
tively rich vocabulary of settlement types, with no
other preference. In the early stage of this research,
I read full texts and noted words which might rep-
resent settlement types. These selected words were
then put into search tools (mostly online).4 Some
of these words were later excluded when proven to
relate to property, agriculture, administration, or
architectural elements. While document collections
and search tools can be selective, I balanced the pos-
sible biases by assembling all major sources available.
The terms were gathered by a quantitative method
from sources with richer data (i.e. Arabic geo­graphies)
and from all other texts through context. The texts
use termino­logy of settlement types in particular
forms with different qualities: a) a direct reference,
and thus a distinct one, e.g. ‘al-Ramla is a city’; b)
a general reference, which is more ambiguous, e.g.
‘two markets are in the city’; c) a fixed or historic
‘incorporated toponym’ which here means a settle-
ment-type term which is part of the place name, or
of a formula, and therefore does not reflect the con-
temporary status of the settlement. For example,
the toponym Diospolis in Greek might have kept its
name even after losing its administrative (or other)
essence as polis. The modern translations of the
terms are also significant, both for the contextual
interpretation of the term and for historio­graphic
purposes. It will be noted (in round brackets) when-
ever it was available in the edited manu­script or in
additional translations.
The full results of this part of the research, where
an emphasis was put on changes in termino­logy until
the thirteenth century, have been published else-
where (Nol 2020a). In this paper, I emphasize the
coherent set of settlement terms which was identified
and its comparison with the archaeo­logical results.
One of the methods involved looking at terms listed
together in a sentence, as this indicates their con-
currence and might also point to their being anto-
nyms and of relative importance. Another method
was to compare toponyms that were addressed by
more than one type of source, which highlights par-
allels or synonyms, translation of terms, and changes
in the termino­logy.
This research shows that between the seventh
and the eleventh centuries, the main set of settle-
ment types in Palestine included (as they are com-
4 The Princeton Geniza Project Library <https:/​/g​ eniza.
princeton.edu/​pgpsearch/> [accessed 19 July 2019]; Online
Responsa Project <https:/​/​www.responsa.co.il/> [accessed 16
March 2019]; TEI 2020.
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 2 07
monly translated): 1) city or town (madīna, polis),
2) village or town (qarya, kome, ʿîr), 3) estate, ham-
let, farmstead, or village (ḍayʿa, kafr), 4) monas-
tery (dayr, monasterion), and 5) fortress, citadel,
tower, or camp (burj, kastron, mivṣār). The discus-
sion of this section is dedicated to explaining and
translating the terms madīna, qarya, and kafr. In the
twelfth century, as the wider research has shown
(Nol 2020a), several Arabic terms were added (e.g.
balda, thaghr, bulayd), and terms were replaced in
Hebrew (e.g. ʿîr for medînâ).
Settlement Types in Contemporary Texts
The first source is the Taktikon in Greek, written or
edited around 880, which describes the domain of
authority exercised by the Jerusalem patriarchate of
Palestine and its surroundings. Two different versions
of the manu­script exist, one published by G. Palamas
in 1862 and the other published by Ierosholumon
Timotheous in 1939 (Levy-Rubin 2003, 201), which
is the version accessed for this paper. The Taktikon
marks toponyms and topo­graphic elements in the
landscape and notes terms for settlement types. It
mentions the terms polis (town), monasterion and
kastron (fortress) (or kasteli).5 More frequent is the
term kome (village), which appears chiefly in incor-
porated toponyms (e.g. Kome Zounou) or as an
administrative formula (klimatos Galga and kome
Gaza) (Timotheous 1939, 79, 81; Levy-Rubin 2003,
210). Moreover, the term choria (sing. chorion) is
mentioned once by Timotheous and is translated
as an ‘estate’ by Milka Levy-Rubin. Other choria in
Palamas’s version appear as perichora by Timotheous’s
text, which Levy-Rubin translates as ‘environs’ or ‘sur-
roundings’ (Levy-Rubin 2003, 210, 212), and Adolf
Grohmann (1959, 33) translates it in other contexts
as Nachbargebiet (a neighbouring area).
The next source, the Jewish texts, comprise doc-
uments from the Cairo Geniza archive and rabbinic
legal texts, written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, or
‘Judeo-Arabic’ (briefly, Arabic language in Hebrew
characters). Most of the rabbinic texts used in this
study date between the eighth and the tenth centu-
ries with no possibility to refine that date, whereas
the Geniza documents are from the eleventh cen-
tury. These texts relate to the Jewish communities
in Palestine and Egypt but also elsewhere. The rab-
binic texts include Sheʿelôt w-T eshûvôt (Questions
and Answers, responsa) and Halākhôt Gedôlôt (Great
Halacha Rules), which were accessed online, and Igeret
lā-Rav Sherîrā Gaʾôn (Epistle of Rabbi Sherira Gaon)
5 Only by Timotheous (1939, 80).
from 980 (Neubauer 1887, 6–42). The Geniza docu-
ments were accessed both online and through pub-
lished editions (Mann 1922; Friedman 1981; Gil 1983).
In Hebrew/​Aramaic, the most common terms are
medînâ/​medhīnāthā (city) and ʿîr (village or town).6
The terms appear as direct references (Friedman
1981, 107–09, 130, 157, 181–82, 213; Gil 1983, ii, 476,
480) and as incorporated toponyms (e.g Medînāt
Fās, ʿÎr Ṣahrajt) (Gil 1983, ii, 121, 177–78; Oxford,
Bodl., MS Heb. b. 11/​9; BL, Or. 5544.1; Neubauer
1887, 40). These terms are also utilized as general
references with activities or groups of an imagined
space, such as the elite which are literally ‘the big
(people) of the ʿîr’ (gedôlē hā-ʿîr) (Gil 1983, ii, 239.
See also 84, 204, 506, 508). However, only the term
ʿîr is present in poetic expressions, such as ‘a refuge
town’ (ʿîr miqlaṭ) (Gil 1983, ii, 19; Cam­bridge, T-S,
18J4.26), or in fixed formulas, such as ‘the capital’
(hā-ʿîr ha-gedôlâ (the big city)) (Gil 1983, ii, 262,
382). Less common terms in these sources include
mivṣār (fortress), qiryâ (town) as an incorporated
toponym — Qiryāt Ônô, and kefar (village).7
In Arabic, the two terms often used in the Geniza
are balad (city) and madīna (city). The references
to balad mostly relate to an imagined space within
a general reference (e.g. ‘al-balad akhadhahu maṭar
ʿaẓīm wa-thalj’ (the balad was caught by heavy rain
and snow)) (Gil 1983, iii, 197), but might also be part
of incorporated toponyms (e.g. Balad al-Raqqa, Balad
al-Jurba) (Gil 1983, ii, 703; Cam­bridge, T-S, 12.13).
The term madīna is used less frequently, mainly as
an incorporated toponym, but also as a general ref-
erence (e.g. ‘dakhaltu ilā-l-madīna’ (I entered the
madīna)) (Gil 1983, ii, 577; iii, 332; Cam­bridge, T-S,
18J4.14). Much more uncommon, single references
are found in the document ‘Guide to Jerusalem’
with dayr (monastery) and qaṣr (fortress, palace)
(Braslavi 1964; Gil 1983, ii, 6–7). Other scattered
texts use ḥiṣn (fortress), qarya as in the incorporated
toponym Qaryat Ḥamuriya, balda (village, town, or
city), and ḍayʿa (village).8 Save for the single refer-
ence mentioned, dayr was absent from the Hebrew
and Aramaic sources. Outside Palestine, one text
on Fusṭāṭ describes a qaṣr, calling it also a burj in a
context which indicates that the two terms function
as synonyms (Cam­bridge, T-S, 12.694).
Three geo­graphers who portray Palestine from the
late ninth to the late tenth centuries in Arabic were
6 For town, see Friedman 1981, 170–71 n. 3.
7 Friedman 1983, 73–85; Gil 1983, ii, 81–82, 382, 538–40; Cam­bridge,
Moss., vii. 4.1. For the translation of kefar, see Sokoloff 2002, 267.
8 Gil 1983, iii, 81, 437; 1994, 54–55; Friedman 1986, 279–83;
Cam­bridge, T-S, 13J8.25v; New York, ENA, 2922.30. For the trans­
lation of balda, see also the later text: Cam­bridge, T-S, 13J9.10.
208 hagi t n o l

Table 10.5. Frequency of settlement-type terms in the three Arabic geo­graphies. Table 10.6 compares these terms with the terms used
only for settlement types in Palestine. The tables
al-Yaʿqūbī al-Iṣṭakhrī al-Maqdisī exclude terms that are very general or administra-
madīna 643 (83 per cent) 910 (62 per cent) 1001 (50 per cent) tive, or terms that are mainly used for very differ-
balda 3 3 26 (1 per cent) ent meanings, such as the word miṣr which usually
bulayda 0 0 1
means ‘Egypt’ in the same works. At the same time,
the table includes terms that were often used to
qarya 44 (6 per cent) 275 (19 per cent) 338 (17 per cent)
describe elements within sites and not necessarily
ḍayʿa 17 (2 per cent) 34 (2 per cent) 51 (2.5 per cent) settlement types, such as ḥiṣn, a fortress, or incorpo-
36 (5 per cent) 87 (6 per cent) 277 (14 per cent) rated toponyms (e.g. Madīnat al-Salām). Nonetheless,
ḥiṣn
contextual analyses will refine that list. Table 10.5
qalʿa 17 (2 per cent) 71 (5 per cent) 115 (6 per cent) shows that the three terms most used by all authors
2 77 (5 per cent) 169 (8 per cent) and in relatively great numbers are madīna (town,
ribāṭ
city), qarya (village), and ḥiṣn (fortress).9 The sec-
dayr 13 (1.5 per cent) 14 (1 per cent) 24 (1 per cent) ond most important terms are ribāṭ and qalʿa. Table
Total 775 1471 2002 10.6 demonstrates that the only term which is men-
tioned in relation to Palestine by all three authors
Table 10.6. A comparison of settlement-type terms from Palestine with other is madīna, while qarya is attributed to Palestine by
regions in the Arabic geo­graphies. * = incorporated toponym; ** = appears two of them. Terms that cannot be found in these
once; ( ) = not a settlement type. Abbreviations: F = Palestine; A = other regions. texts for settlement types in Palestine but are found
elsewhere are: ḥiṣn, qalʿa, qaṣr, balda, and balad.
al-Yaʿqūbī al-Iṣṭakhrī al-Maqdisī Some of these terms can be found in the texts, but
madīna AF AF AF not as independent settlement types. For instance,
qarya A AF AF the term ḥiṣn might be used by al-Maqdisī but only
for fortification elements inside other settlement
ḍayʿa A A AF
types, such as in the madīna of Yāfā or qarya of Ḥabrā
balda A A A (al-Maqdisī, Aḥsan al-taqāsīm, 172–74). The term
bulayda A** qalʿa can be found in the description of Yubnā by
A A A(F)
al-Yaʿqūbī, but in the meaning of a hill or tell that the
ḥiṣn settlement sits on (al-Yaʿqūbī, Kitāb al-Buldān, 329).
qalʿa A(F) A A The documentary evidence is a very important
A A AF/​(F) contribution to our corpus for its authenticity and
ribāṭ its early date (the seventh and eighth centuries).
dayr A A AF* Nevertheless, these texts are also the most scat-
qaṣr A A A tered, and they rarely note terms of settlement types.
Relevant epi­graphy comprises foundation inscrip-
balad A A A
tions, waqf (endowment under Islamic law) inscrip-
chosen for the purposes of this research, providing tions, seals, and pottery. Lead seals found in Israel/​
richer relevant information than other contempora- Palestine, dated approximately to the late seventh
neous authors. Their definition as geo­graphers is a century (Amitai-Preiss 2007; 2015), frequently bear
modern observation and is sometimes disputed but incorporated toponyms. These include madīna (city)
serves the purposes of this paper. The list includes the and kafr (village), such as Kafr Ḥabrā. The seals
Baghdad-born historian and geo­grapher al-Yaʿqūbī also display administrative titles — those of kūra
(d. after 908), who completed his Kitāb al-Buldān and iqlīm. One seal that bears kūrat ʿAsqalān on the
(Book of Lands) around 891 (Anthony and Gordon one side and Madīnat ʿAsqalān on the other implies
2018; Zaman 2002); al-Iṣṭakhrī (d. after 950), who that ʿAsqalān answered both definitions of madīna
wrote Kitāb al-Masālik wa-l-mamālik (Book of Routes and kūra. However, not every madīna was a kūra, as
and Realms) around 950 (Tibbetts 1992, 109; Miquel in the inscribed seal khātim kūrat Qaysārīya on one
1978); and al-Maqdisī (d. after 990), who composed side and Madīnat Arsūf on the other (Amitai-Preiss
Aḥsan al-taqāsīm fī maʿrifat al-aqālīm (Best Division 2007, 26, 152–62; 2015, 78; Amitai-Preiss and Tal 2015).
for the Knowledge of the Provinces) sometime after A somewhat similar medium are stamped ceramic
985 (Miquel 1993). jars, which have been unearthed in excavations in
The analysis of the geo­graphical data is mostly
quantitative. Table 10.5 shows terms of settlement
types that appear in the whole work in question. 9 Translations follow Le Strange 1890.
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 2 09

Table 10.7. Different toponyms and their settlement termino­logy in the main sources. Names are given in Arabic, save for
Jerusalem and Ônô. * = incorporated toponym; ** = Under the toponyms: Īliyāʾ, Bayt al-Maqdis, or Yerûshālayim.

Seventh century Ninth to tenth century Ninth century Eighth to early eleventh century
Toponym Seals/​Papyri Geo­graphy Taktikon Jewish Sources
Ghazza kūra madīna, kūra medînâ
ʿAsqalān madīna, kūra madīna medînâ
Qaysāriyya kūra madīna
Arsūf madīna madīna
Kafr Sābā* qarya kome
Nābulus kūra madīna (above kefars)
Ônô kome* qiryâ*
Jerusalem** kūra madīna, kūra ʿîr ha-qôdesh
Arīḥā madīna polis*
Ḥabrā kafr* qarya
Bayt Jibrīn kūra madīna, kūra

Israel/​Palestine and date to the eighth–tenth centu-
ries. Some bear the inscription Dayr Samwīl (CIAP
iii, 122–24; Amitai-Preiss, Cohen-Weinberger, and
Har-Even 2017), which is an incorporated toponym.
On foundation inscriptions, terms that can be
affiliated with Palestine are qarya as an incorporated
toponym (CIAP i, 6), burj (tower) (TEI 2020, card
nos 6034, 28342), ḍayʿa (estate) (Elad 1991, 304), and
thaghr. The terms in these inscriptions are usually
a direct reference (e.g. ‘amara bi-ʿimārat hadha burj
al-mubārak’ (he commanded the construction of this
blessed burj)) (TEI 2020, card no. 28342). However,
they always represent architectural elements — for-
tifications in our case — and not independent settle-
ment types. A different example is Thaghr ʿAsqalān,
an incorporated toponym, which was mentioned in
an inscription from Ascalon in the eleventh century
(TEI 2020, card no. 6598) as well as in an inscrip-
tion from Acre in the twelfth century (TEI 2020,
card no. 7774). Whereas scholars commonly trans-
late thaghr as ‘frontier’, Michael Bonner (1994) sug-
gests it to mean a ‘fortified town’ in its singular form,
and Moshe Sharon (CIAP ii, 275) translates it as a
‘coastal fortress’.10 A waqf inscription from the elev-
enth century provides a direct reference to ḍayʿa
(Yadin 1964, 106; CIAP ii, 275) which indicates that
the term is associated with property.
The last group of sources are the papyri which
were unearthed in Nessana and Khirbat al-Mird. The
relevant documents from Nessana, mainly in Greek,
date to the seventh century. They use the terms
kome (village), chorion, which Casper J. Kraemer
10 Compare Brauer 1995, 14; Antrim 2012, 39; Bosworth 2000.
translates as ‘our native town’, kastron (camp), and
polis (city district) (Kraemer 1958, 136–38, 153–55,
168–74). In fact, while Elusa is always termed polis,
also in earlier papyri, Nessana changes from being
a kome in the sixth century to a kastron in the early
seventh century, and a chorion at the end of the sev-
enth century (Kraemer 1958, docs 16–18, 21, 46, 58).
The highly damaged papyri from Khirbat al-Mird,
written in Arabic, are attributed to the seventh cen-
tury. A single relevant document uses the sentence
‘fī qarya min kūrat’ (a village belonging to the dis-
trict) (Grohmann 1963, 19–20).
Sets of Settlement Types
In this section I use two methods to present the sets
of termino­logy for each language or community.
The first method is a comparison between different
types of sources which employ the same toponyms
(Table 10.7). This comparison enables us to recog-
nize equivalents in the various languages. It also
allows for detecting changes over time, but this has
been dealt with elsewhere (Nol 2020a). My premises
are that the toponym is a single settlement; and that
when various names are involved, previous identifi-
cations and parallels are valid (e.g. Shekhem means
Nābulus). Table 10.7 presents the most distinct term
madīna with its parallel medînâ, also showing that the
term kūra is exclusively used for madīnas. Based on
Kafr Sābā (and to some extent on Ônô), the terms
qiryâ/​qarya and kome are equivalents.
The second method for detecting sets of settle-
ment types regards sentences that list two to three
types together and demonstrate their concurrency
210 hagi t n o l

Table 10.8. A summary of settlement-type terms in different languages in Palestine during the seventh–eleventh centuries.
* = incorporated toponyms. Abbreviations: Ep = epi­graphy; Ge = geo­graphy; Gnz = Geniza; Pp = papyri; Tk = Taktikon; Rs = responsa.

Arabic Greek Greek Arabic Hebrew Judeo-Arabic Arabic

Media
Ep, Pp Pp Tk Ge, Ep Gnz, Rs Gnz Ep
Translations
medînâ madīna,
City, town madīna polis polis madīna
(symbolic: ʿîr) balad
kome*, kome* balda,
Village, town qarya qarya ʿîr
chorion (chorion) qarya*
Hamlet, farm, estate, village kafr* (chorion) kafr*, ḍayʿa kefar ḍayʿa ḍayʿa
Monastery dayr* monasterion dayr* dayr
Fortress, citadel, tower, camp kastron kastron burj, ḥiṣn mivṣār ḥiṣn, qaṣr burj, thaghr*
Century
Seventh
Eighth
Ninth
Tenth
Eleventh

as well as being antonyms. This method was most
fruitful in the wider research, where several texts of
the twelfth century were also examined (Nol 2020a),
but it still provides some context here. Texts in the
Geniza clarify the regional superiority of the medînâ
over the ʿîr and the kefar. This is, for instance, seen in
a list of toponyms in which medînāt Ṣefat is repeated
while the adjacent ʿîrs change (Mann 1922, 204),11 and
it is apparent from the phrases ‘Yerûshālayim w-kŏl
ʿîrehā’ ( Jerusalem and all its ʿîrs) and ‘Shekhem w-kŏl
kefareyhā’ (Nābulus and all its kefars) (Gil 1983, ii,
181, 382). Importantly, three terms (excluding ‘city’)
are encountered together in a text which describes
the Jewish community in Palestine, in the line ‘el kŏl
qehilôt Yisrāʾel asher be-Ereṣ Yisrāʾel be-mivṣāreyhā
w-ʿîreyhā w-kefareyhā’ (to the entire communities
of Israel which are in Palestine in its mivṣārs and its
ʿîrs and its kefars) (Gil 1983, iii, 431–32).
Terms in various languages and different sources
throughout the whole period can be placed in one
chart (Table 10.8). The results of the toponym com-
parison, along with modern translations and word
similarity, enable us to place settlement terms side
by side. Incorporated toponyms are also in the list,
but they are marked as such. Following this method,
11 ‘bā-ʿîr Bîriyâ ha-semûkhâ li-medînāt Ṣefat […], bā-ʿîr ʿAqāl Zêtûn
ha-semûkhâ li-medînāt Ṣefat’ (at the ʿîr Bîriyâ which is adjacent to
the medînâ of Sefat […], at the ʿîr ʿAqāl which is adjacent to the
medînâ of Sefat) and so on.
madīna is a synonym to polis; qarya is a synonym to
kome, chorion, and ʿîr; and kafr is a synonym to ḍayʿa.
This list lacks the term ribāṭ, which does not appear
in any media other than Arabic geo­graphies, particu-
larly not in inscriptions. Analysing the word contexts
in these geo­graphies suggests that it was mainly a
structure or an institution inside settlements, rather
than an independent settlement type, and it was not
necessarily fortified (Nol 2020a). The list also lacks
terms which express the meaning of a metropolis or
a capital, a subject I will address shortly.
Translating the Termino­logy of Settlement Types
The comparison in Table 10.8, particularly the epi­
graphic evidence, suggests that the term kafr (in
Hebrew and Arabic) shifted in Arabic to ḍayʿa in
the tenth century or earlier. Historians and transla-
tors interpret the two terms diversely, from ‘village’
to ‘hamlet’, ‘farm’, and ‘estate’ (Amitai-Preiss 2015,
78; Björnesjö 1996, 29; Elad 1991, 304; Friedman
1986, 280–82; Grohmann 1952, 214–18), but this is
not conclusive. The ownership of both the kefar in
the rabbinic sources and the ḍayʿa in inscriptions
is private, implying its suitable translation as an
‘estate’. One inscription, for example, reads: ‘hadhā
mā awqafa al-faqīh […] bi-waqfihi hadihi al-ḍayʿa
bi-ḥudūdihā’ (this is what the jurist [name] donated
on his waqf: this ḍayʿa on its borders) (Yadin 1964,
106). One text in the Jewish responsa discusses a sit-
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es
Table 10.9. Characteristics of al-Maqdisī’s qaryas in Palestine.
Site/​Characteristics Mosque (M)/​Church (C)
Bayt Laḥm C (in the past)
Ḥabrā M (masjid)
Ludd C, M (jāmiʿ)
Kafr Sābā M (jāmiʿ)
ʿĀqir M (jāmiʿ)
Yubnā M (jāmiʿ)
ʿAmwās M (minbar)
Kafr Salām M (jāmiʿ)
uation in which the landlords — literally ‘the own-
ers of the kefars’ (beʿalē hā-kefarîm) — gather. The
purpose of their meeting is to settle the tax portions
in consonance with the land size of each kefar and
‘to level their bribes in order to remove the bur-
den’ (lehishtāvôt bā-hashḥādâ she-mashḥîdîn lesaleq
hā-ônes).12 With a different meaning but also a dif-
ferent geo­graphical context, Severus or Sāwīrūs ibn
al-Muqaffaʿ (d. 987), the bishop of al-Ushmūnayn in
Egypt, writes in the tenth century about twenty-three
ḍayʿas of Orthodox Christians, which he subsumes
under one name (Sakāṭīnā) (ibn al-Muqaffaʿ, Kitāb
Siyar, 97). That single name, and the absence of any
note of a landowner, imply their independence and
support the ‘hamlet’ interpretation, at least in Egypt.
Similarly, Ze’ev Safrai (1994, 19) explains the kefar
in the Talmud (third–sixth centuries), as either a
‘hamlet’ or an ‘estate’. At any rate, these terms denote
a small residence unit with agricultural lands that
could be privately owned. Additional to the shift
of terms, ḍayʿa in Arabic and villa in Latin widened
their meaning to include also ‘village’ or ‘village ter-
ritory’ (Wickham 2019, n. 26).
The term qarya in Arabic has been commonly
translated as ‘village’ (e.g. Le Strange 1890; CIAP i,
107; Grohmann 1963, 20). In other words, it is inter-
preted as a non-city and more specifically as a small,
non-central settlement. However, the comparisons
in Table 10.8 present its various equivalents, which
have sometimes been translated also as ‘town’, such as
chorion or ʿîr. In Arabic too, Tarif Khalidi (1981, 266)
reads qarya in the Koran as ‘city’ and as a synonym
to madīna. The characteristics which were ascribed
to qarya in Palestine are homogeneous but limited,
according to al-Maqdisī (Table 10.9). The table pre-
sents a mosque or a church in all eight toponyms,
water sources in two, and almost no other features.
The term balda, which I put in the same category as
qarya, was rarely used by the geo­graphers (twenty-six
12 Teshûvôt ha-Geʾônîm – Geʾônê Mizrāḥ w-Maʿarāv, simān q.s.h.
2 11
Market Fortification Water sources Agriculture
ḥiṣn yes (fruit)
yes
times by al-Maqdisī), and never within Palestine.
Between around 1100 and 1200, it was already used
in the Geniza, but gained popularity in texts of the
early thirteenth century (Nol 2020a). Translating
qarya as ‘town’ generates a more ‘city-like’ percep-
tion, which correlates better with the synonyms.
Following this decision, the next settlement type in
the administrative hierarchy and in possible size, the
ḍayʿa/​ kefar can be translated as ‘village’.
The most popular term in this research con-
text, in all languages and at all times, is madīna.
Still, its unique characteristics are difficult to detect
and define. In al-Maqdisī’s introduction to Egypt,
he writes that there is no madīna without a min-
bar (al-Maqdisī, Aḥsan al-taqāsīm, 193). A minbar is
commonly interpreted in the context of mosques as
a physical platform for the leader to give the Friday
sermon (e.g. Kuban 1974, 3), yet also that set of
termino­logy should be examined afresh. Table 10.10
focuses on the physical features of madīnas as noted
by al-Maqdisī. It also includes al-Ramla, which is
both a madīna and a metropolis or a regional capital
(qaṣaba). The table introduces the significant char-
acteristics of the madīna, whether big or small, as
comprising mosques (75 per cent), water sources (50
per cent), and fortifications (50 per cent). Including
al-Ramla, the qaṣaba with the madīnas does not sig-
nificantly change the results regarding mosques (77
per cent) and water sources (54 per cent).
Comparing qaryas with madīnas (Tables 10.9
and 10.10) provides little correlation as to specific
characteristics. Based on the data from al-Maqdisī,
however, the markets are exclusive to madīnas, and
churches are exclusive to qaryas. The most signifi-
cant difference between the terms is the concentra-
tion of features in the madīna. No correlation was
found regarding mosques (or any specific term for
mosques). Fortifications are attributed to madīna
more often than to other settlement types but not
exclusively. Another difference that can be inferred
from the tables is the regional superiority of madīna.
In accordance with that result, al-Maqdisī writes
212 hagi t n o l

Table 10.10. Characteristics of al-Maqdisī’s madīnas in Palestine.

* Rustāqs in the research area are read as lands surrounding a central site or belonging to it administratively.

Site/​ Market Water Rustāq*/​

Mosque Fortification Agriculture Size
Characteristics (sing./​pl.) Sources Qaryas
Dājūn jāmiʿ
Bayt al-Maqdis masjid pl. ḥiṣn yes (fruit) big
Bayt Jibrīl yes
Ghazza jāmiʿ big
Maymās yes small
ʿAsqalān jāmiʿ pl. yes yes (fruit) big
Yāfā jāmiʿ ḥiṣn small
Arsūf minbar yes small
Qaysāriyya jāmiʿ ḥiṣn yes (fruit)
Nābulus jāmiʿ two yes (olives)
Arīḥā yes orchards yes
ʿAmmān jāmiʿ, masjid sing. yes (fields perhaps outside) yes
Subtotal (12) 9 4 6 6 3
al-Ramla (qaṣaba) jāmiʿ, masjids pl. yes fields, orchards yes
Total (13) 10 5 6 7 4

that Kafr Salām is one of the qaryas of Qaysariyya
(al-Maqdisī, Aḥsan al-taqāsīm, 175–76), Nessana
is described as a chorion under the jurisdiction of
Elusa, and the Geniza documents note the con-
trol of Jerusalem and Ṣefat over ʿîrs and the control
of Nābulus over kefars (Kraemer 1958, 168–71; Gil
1963, ii, 382; Mann 1922, 204). The interpretation
of the madīna as geo­graphically central correlates
with various research paradigms, among them the
central-place theory. However, these studies might
relate to metropolises rather than to all madīnas, as
we shall see.
The complete set of settlement types excluded
the metropolis. This might be a result of methodo­
logy regarding one of our main sources, the Arabic
geo­graphies, which was examined quantitatively.
First, the terms denoting metropolises could not be
counted, as they are not particular to that meaning.
For example, the word qaṣaba can mean ‘citadel’ in
the same text, making its count rather meaningless.
Second, one can expect to have only a small number
of administrative capitals in every region, so they
can be expected to appear less often in texts than
other settlement types.
Nevertheless, the ancient authors rarely called
the metropolis of Palestine or Syria other than ‘city’
save for al-Maqdisī. This leads me to argue next that
the term ‘city’ represents both meanings — to the
authors and/​or to their informants. The first exam-
ple is the papyri and the Taktikon in Greek, which
do not distinguish between different types of polis.
The texts in Hebrew indeed point to ‘the big city’
but employ the term ʿîr, which means ‘town’ or the
symbolic city, and do not create a designated word.
Moving to the geo­graphers, al-Yaʿqūbī is inconsist-
ent throughout his work. For several areas, he uses
the formula madīnat X al-ʿuẓmā (‘the greatest city’),
but for Syria, he defines the metropolises with ‘the
madīna of the region’ (al-Yaʿqūbī, Kitāb al-Buldān,
325–27, 334, 347). The text by al-Iṣṭakhrī reflects a
time of change, with only five references to al-madīna
al-ʿuẓmā, and forty-one references to a new term —
qaṣaba — which is clearly a synonym (e.g. Qurṭuba
or Fās) (al-Iṣṭakhrī, Kitāb al-Masālik, 39, 41, 46).
However, he calls Ṭabariyya and al-Ramla ‘al-madīna
al-ʿaẓīma’ (the great city) and ‘al-madīna al-kubrā’
(the greatest city) of their regions (al-Iṣṭakhrī, Kitāb
al-Masālik, 56–59).
Al-Maqdisī is the first to employ a consistent
termino­logy for the administrative status of places,
capitals among them. He defines two types: the
miṣr as the capital of the iqlīm (a mega-region, such
as Egypt), and qaṣaba as the capital of the kūra, the
subprovince. He does not use the term al-madīna
al-ʿuẓmā. Interestingly, al-Maqdisī also defines the
‘capital’ and distinctly points to the mix-up people
make between it and other settlements. He explains
that miṣr is defined differently by jurists, linguists,
the common people, and ‘us’ (naḥnu): according to
the common people, a miṣr is ‘any important large
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 2 13
settlement’ (kull balad kabīr jalīl), such as al-Ramla.
He explains, however, that ‘we consider a miṣr every
balad where the highest authority resides, the gov-
ernment offices are assembled, the administrations
are affiliated to it, and the madīnas of the iqlīm are
adjoined to it’, such as Dimashq (fa-jaʿalnā al-miṣr
kull balad ḥallahu al-sulṭān al-aʿẓam wa-jumiʿat ilayhi
al-dīwāwīn wa-qullidat minhu al-aʿmāl wa-uḍīfa ilayhi
mudun al-iqlīm). He also clarifies that the miṣr is the
qaṣaba of its kūra, ‘but not every qaṣaba is a miṣr’
(wa-laysa kull qaṣaba miṣran) (al-Maqdisī, Aḥsan
al-taqāsīm, 47).13 It is clear, then, that al-Maqdisī is
interested in an administrative definition of capitals
rather than their economic status in the region. In
fact, looking again at the characteristics of cities he
reports on (Table 10.10), his three ‘big cities’ might
be ‘metropolises’ rather than physically large places.
Likewise, cities that control their surroundings might
also be ‘metropolises’. In that case, also al-Maqdisī
defines the metropolis as ‘city’.
To summarize, the set of settlement types in
Palestine includes city, town, and village, as well as
monastery and fortress, which I have not discussed
here. The definition of these types was based on the
scope of their services, their relation to trade, and
their administrative status. Since most settlement
types included agriculture, this is not an essential
characteristic for differentiating between them. The
metropolis does not form another settlement type.
It is first and foremost a city.
Termino­logy of Settlement Types
vs. Typo­logy of Archaeo­logical Sites
Site type 1 includes Mazliah, Lod, Bet Dagan, Azor,
Jaffa, and Tell Qasile. The six sites sit on the ‘north-
ern’ coast or on a route which leads to Ramla, they
all have a market, and they might all have offered
other available services such as water supply and a
bath house. The most uncommon artefacts in the
research area could also be found here. While these
sites show some evidence of crafts, it is relatively
scarce, and evidence of mass production in agri-
culture or industries is absent. The site of Mazliah
near Ramla is exceptional in that regard since it is
distinctly industrial. The madīna similarly com-
prises a concentration of available services, such as
agriculture, markets, a mosque, and fortifications.
Its economy is related to trade more than other set-
tlement types. The correlation with the physical
evidence, if valid, demonstrates that cities are not
13 Translation by Peter Verkinderen (personal communication),
with adjustments.
always spatially central to other sites, and that the
distance between them or from them to other sites
is not relevant. Second, cities in this context were
occupied with trade or distribution, but not so much
with production. Third, fortifications and mosques,
which are expected in some madīnas, could not be
traced on any of the type 1 sites.
Site type 2 includes Ramla’s centre and stadium
and ten more sites from Kafr Jinnis to Ashdod-
Yam. These sites contain most of the architectural
elements which are found in type 1 sites but at a
much lower rate. In addition, rare objects made
of bone and infrequent stamped jar handles were
unearthed at some of the sites and imply their rela-
tion to trade. Unlike type 1 sites, however, this group
is very productive, with both major industries and
large-scale agriculture. Finally, fortifications and
a mosque were detected at one of the type 2 sites,
Ashdod-Yam. These characteristics might fit the
qarya (town) in the sources, which is very similar
to the ‘city’ but never supplies all the services the
city offers. If this correlation is valid, then towns
were the main productive settlements in the region.
The data suggest that these settlements were mostly
absent around cities.
Site type 3 comprises six sites, three around Azor
(Or Yehuda, Ramat Gan, and Hadar Yosef ) and
three in the Rehovot cluster (Yad Eli’ezer, Weizmann
Institute, and Kefar Gabirol). All six sites included
one of the larger types of fire installations, and most
were related to pottery production. This site type is
the only one without channels and other water instal-
lations, suggesting it was not involved in any sort of
agriculture. The best termino­logical match for type 3
— based on its characteristics — is the term bulayda.
The term is noted once in the book by al-Maqdisī
(perhaps as a later addition) but becomes popular
in the thirteenth century. Analysing the termino­
logy of the later period (Nol 2020a, table 7) suggests
that bulayda is trade-oriented with no mosques and
very little agriculture, as opposed to the qarya of that
time. If we are to accept the correlation of bulayda
with site type 3, then we must explain the tempo-
ral gap of several hundred years between the date of
the site type and the earliest appearance of the term.
While it is certainly possible that a new settlement
type, which emerges regionally, gains its own term
centuries later, probably after being ‘successful’ (i.e.
long-lived and geo­graphically popular), this is only
a speculation. Nonetheless, the comparison points
to one clear lacuna in the written sources and thus
highlights the corrupted picture of settlement pat-
terns when relying solely on texts.
The eighteen sites of type 4 are characterized
by water installations, which represent agriculture.
214 hagi t n o l
These sites show no flagstone pavement which would
point to a marketplace, nor any of the industrial fire
installations. A few of them contained craft waste
(Ramla, Horvat Zerifin, Ramat Hahayal, and Khirbat
al-ʿAṣfūra) or a wine press (Ben-Gurion Airport and
Rishon Leziyyon). Copper coins were found on ten
of the sites, indicating some level of exchange, per-
haps related to their production activities. Moreover,
a courtyard house of approximately 30 × 30 m was
unearthed on one of these sites, Khirbat al-Ẓāhiri-
yya (Kogan-Zehavi and Hadad 2013). The settle-
ment type that can be associated with these sites is
the village (kafr, ḍayʿa) of local texts. This type of
settlement is characterized by agriculture and can
be privately owned. However, it could also mean
monasteries, for which the information in texts is
likewise scarce. One may notice that the Muslim geo­
graphers of the ninth–tenth centuries rarely men-
tion ḍayʿas (with 2 per cent of all settlement types in
their books) even though it is clearly one of the most
popular site types in the research area. In addition,
intensive industry can be associated with a number
of these sites, hence with villages (or monasteries).
One site in this group, Yavne-Yam, is not a perfect
fit. Like other sites of type 4, it possesses a complex
of wells, channels, and pools, and excludes flagstone
pavements and fire installations. However, unlike
the other sites but with resemblance to type 1, it
is located on the coast, has a bath house, and lies
adjacent to a relatively big Roman site (Vitto 1998;
Fischer and Taxel 2014, Area B). I suggest that it was
a city at the beginning of our time frame but did not
get updated with the trends which made cities cen-
tral and important later. Based also on its fortifica-
tion elements, it is possible that it became a fortress
(ḥiṣn) and not a regular village. Its interpretation as
a fortress agrees with the one offered by the excava-
tors (Fischer and Taxel 2014).
Unlike any other site in the region, all of which
answer the definition of one type, Ramla was com-
posed of one city, two towns, and several villages.
This entity incorporated a few markets and/​or indus-
trial areas (with Mazliah being intensively produc-
tive) and different dwelling areas. This cluster of
sites physically united in the late ninth century, with
a mosque erected between the clusters in the tenth
or eleventh century (Nol 2019). The unification of
the Ramla sites into one physical unit correlates
with the transformation of al-Ramla from a city into
a metropolis in the ninth century according to our
analysis of termino­logy (Nol 2020a). This means
that the term ‘metropolis’ can denote, physically, a
cluster of sites. The correlation also supports our
former conclusion: that a metropolis is not a set-
tlement type in itself.
Conclusions
Historical archaeo­logies hold the great advantage of
being able to use another source — primary texts.
In the archaeo­logy of Early Islam, this opportu-
nity is mainly channelled into the interpretation
of structures and layers on sites based on narra-
tive literature. This paper utilizes texts for their
‘inside’ views on settlement types in Palestine and
compares them to archaeo­logically based observa-
tions. Brian Hayden (1984) questions the possible
correlations between emic and etic typo­logies and
emphasizes the superiority of the etic/​archaeo­
logical classification over the emic/​ethno­graphic
one. Roland Fletcher (2010) warns us not to attrib-
ute too much weight to words, as they might reflect
idealized concepts. However, the subjective typo­
logies in archaeo­logy, on the one hand, and the pos-
itivist nature of the discipline, on the other hand,
necessitate a counterbalance. Each dataset must be
analysed in its own context, avoiding direct analo-
gies. Contrasting the datasets reveals weaknesses in
their interpretation and assists in refining it. This
comparison highlights the difficulty to differenti-
ate some of the site types solely based on their fea-
tures. In other words, if not for the emic approach,
this distinction would be overlooked.
This series of analyses resulted in a clear hierar-
chy of settlement types with different characteris-
tics. It starts with the city, continues with the town
and the market town, and then moves to villages,
monasteries, and fortresses. The main categories
for distinguishing one type from another seem to
be their access to easy transportation, at least in the
case of cities, and the amount of their available ser-
vices. The city provides all the services available in
the region, and the town follows with many. A some-
what similar definition of cities is proposed by Jose
Lobo and others (2020, 734, after O’Sullivan 2011) as
a concentration of activities (and individuals) that is
higher relative to the surroundings. The validity of
these categories and the proposed definition should
be tested on other regions than Israel/​Palestine.
The case study of the present article refutes cer-
tain axioms about ancient cities. Surprisingly enough,
cities in the research area are not spatially central.
They are distributed only in the northern part of
the area, with a small distance between them, and
with very few other site types in their vicinity. This
result disputes premises by the central-place theory
or similar models and their applications in landscape
archaeo­logy. As far as the distance parameter can
be interpreted, it shows no dependence on the city
by other sites and no control from the other direc-
tion, and it presents no competition between cities.
 d e fi n ing ci t i e s and no n-ci t i e s t hro u gh e mi c and e t i c pe rs p ectiv es 2 15
This conclusion adds up with other archaeo­logical
studies from Israel, as well as to the ethno-histori-
cal and ethno-archaeo­logical evidence, which point
to marketplaces outside and in parallel to big sites
(De Ligt 1993, 99–136; Binggeli 2012; Gabrieli, Ben-
Shlomo, and Walker 2014; Nol forthcoming). The
main implication of this result concerns the use of
the central-place theory within network analyses in
archaeo­logy. Evidently, economic centres of regions
and ‘cities’ are not synonyms.
The second unexpected result relates to the size of
sites. Cities are indeed bigger than most other sites,
conforming with the common definition. However,
they are relatively small — certainly in modern eyes
— ranging between 0.2 km2 (i.e. Azor) and 2 km2
(i.e. Lod). Furthermore, two towns show a similar
size to cities (i.e. Gan Yavne and Tel Yavne, around
1 km2), so size cannot be the sole characteristic for
the identification of cities. A third set of results
contradicts the common categorization of cities or
the unique characteristics of settlements (see e.g.
Thomas 2010, 33–35). As it seems, agriculture can
be found in most settlement types and does not sig-
nify ‘villages’, whereas industry can be detected in
villages and is less frequent in cities. A similar sit-
uation can be observed in Viking Age archaeo­logy,
where scholars are baffled by the gap between the
centrality of sites on the one hand and their size and
set of activities on the other, which contradict com-
mon definitions (Sindbæk 2007; Hodges 2012, 98).
The results highlight the importance of a contex-
tual inquiry, a regional overview, and a bottom-up
perspective. In other words, archaeo­logists should
first interpret their data by the data, and only later
employ various theories, models, the historical con-
text, and even their own expectations and common
sense (Hodder and Huston 2003, 167–90). Notably,
the investigation of relatively big settlement sites
in isolation cannot indicate their regional role or
uniqueness (Tesch 2016, 128; Chirikure 2017, 8–9).
A very different picture arrives from the region’s
metropolis, Ramla. First, this is a very large entity
(6 km2), at least when its clusters unite in the ninth
century. Second, it is spatially central. The recurrence
of the regional material culture in Ramla demon-
strates its high economic centralism, perhaps act-
ing as a distributor. In contrast to the other cities, it
was engaged in industry and large-scale agriculture.
Unlike some perceptions of cities as having a single
centre (Wengrow 2018, 26), Ramla is composed of
several settlement types and with distinct activity
areas. Principally, the attributions scholars assign
to ‘cities’ are a very close portrait of our ninth- to
tenth-century metropolis. On the positive side, this
result suggests that comparisons between industrial
and pre-industrial metropolises may be valid, after
they have been securely identified.
This, however, also highlights certain problems.
First, the density and size of Ramla were temporary,
spanning two centuries. Also, it took the place of the
region’s previous capital, Lod, which had never been
very large (Nol 2019). While this is not a new result
(Fletcher 2010, 478–79), it suggests that ancient
‘metropolism’ may come and go while ‘citism’ may
remain. The second issue is how to label or relate
to ‘non-metropolis cities’ which evidently had an
important economic role in the region. This brings
us to the third problem, the lack of unified termino­
logy by archaeo­logists (Fletcher 2020), which leads
to a termino­logical fog over any settlement type. By
translations not nuanced enough, modern scholars
lower the status of settlements until small places van-
ish from the hierarchy. For example, the metropolis
of written sources al-Ramla is considered a ‘town’
by some modern scholars (e.g. Luz 1997; Kennedy
2010, 55–56). The main problem this list points to is
the division between ‘cities’ and ‘non-cities’ being
simplistic and circular. It is time to click on ‘reboot’
and look at our categories afresh.
Text-oriented historians are not to be blamed
for a city-centric perspective. At least within early
Islamic periods, they reflect their commonly metrop-
olis-centric primary sources. In contrast, archaeo­
logical research has the potential of observing the
full range of settlement types. In order to make that
division, we first must understand the characteris-
tics of the sites in our region, detect the attributes
that differentiate them from each other, and then
decide systematically which might be ‘cities’ and/​
or ‘metropolises’ according to our set of etic defini-
tions. Another set of questions can be addressed to
metropolises, investigating their activity areas and
internal chrono­logy. Obviously, these directions of
inquiry are not possible everywhere, with excava-
tions often conducted only in ports, in monumen-
tal places, or at very big sites. In these cases, we
should consider shifting our emphasis and surely
our termino­logy.
Abbreviations
CIAP Corpus inscriptionum Arabicarum Palaestinae,
ed. by M. Sharon, Handbook of Oriental
Studies, 1: The Near and Middle East, 30, 7 vols
(Leiden: Brill, 1997–2021).
TEI 2020 Thesaurus d’Epi­graphie Islamique <http:/​
/​www.epi­graphie-islamique.uliege.be>
[accessed 20 February 2021].
216 hagi t n o l

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