At the gates of the town, which were frequented as the court of justice, the town's market, the rendezvous for loungers, newsmongers, pleasure seekers, there were wide open places of greater or less dimensions, where on important occasions the entire population assembled for consultation or for action (Neh. viii. t, 16 ; 2 Chrou. xxxii. 6 ; 2 Sam. xxi. 12; Job xxix. 7 ; 2 Kings vii. t). The streets were, it has been supposed, not so narrow as streets generally are in modern Oriental towns ; [but this rests almost entirely on the use of the term nvii rehbb, from znn rahab, to be wide, for streets, and on this nothing can be built, because this term properly denotes an open space, and is applied to a street simply as open and free]. Their names were sometimes taken from the wares or goods that were sold in them : thus in Jer. xxxvii. 2r, we read of the bakers' street.' The present bazaars seem to be a continuation of this ancient custom. The streets of Jerusalem at least were paved (Joseph. Antiq. xx. 9. 7) ; but the streets of most cities of Palestine would not need paving, in consequence of the rocky nature of the foundations on which they lay. Herod the Great laid an open road in Antioch with polished stone Uoseph. A ntiq. xvi. 5. 3 ; comp. Kings xx. 34). In regard to the earlier periods, we find only a notice to the effect that Solomon caused the fore-court of the temple to be laid with flags. Besides paved streets, Jerusalem before the exile had an extensive system of watercourses or aqueducts, which seems to have been rendered necessary by the natural supply having been limited to one or two spots in the im mediate vicinity. This subject has been handled by Robinson, and more fully by Olin (ii. 139, seq.: see Is. vii. 3 ; xxii. 9 ; 2 Kings xx. 20 ; Joseph. Antiq. xviii. 3. 2). Other cities were contented with the fountains whose existence had probably led to their formation at the first.
Palestine underwent constant changes in regard to its towns, from the earliest ages ; one conse quence of which is, that there are names of towns that belong exclusively to certain eras. The period
of the Roman domination gave existence, as to structures of great splendour, so to many towns and fortified places. Galilee was especially rich in towns and villages, which, according to Jose phus (Vita, sec. 45), amounted in all to the num ber of 204. The names of the Palestinian cities, for the most part, have meaning, reference being made to the nature of the locality, as Rama, Ain, Jericho, Bethlehem, Gibeon, Mizpah, Many are compounds formed with the aid of one of the following words, n,z (house), VI, or l'Inp (city), -Ivri (court), pnr (valley), mt.t (a grass plot), 'ICC (well), j'3.7 (fountain), r1BZ (hamlet). To dis tinguish cities that bore the same name, the name of the tribe was added. In the latter days,' especially under the Herods, it was the fashion to give to ancient towns new Greek names, as Dios polis, Neapolis, Sebaste, Cmsarea, Tiberias. Jeru salem, at a later period, was denominated /Elia Capitolina. These innovations indicated the slavish disposition of the age, and were tokens of the bondage in which the nation was held ; as much as the incorporation of the name 1,,Z (Baal) at a much earlier era pointed out the Canaanitish origin of a place, and gave reason to think that it was originally addicted to idolatrous worship. The population of towns cannot now be ascertained with any degree of accuracy, for the materials are not only scanty and disconnected, but in a measure uncertain. Respecting the government of towns, we have no detailed information relating to the ante-exilian periods, though it was probably in the hands of the elders ; and in Dent. xvi. 18 Moses commands, Judges (Hengstenberg translates the word scribe' or writer,' Authentie des Pent. i. 450) and officers shalt thou make thee in all thy gates, and they shall judge the people with just judgment.' In the post-exilian era magistrates occur under the name of Council (Joseph. Vita, sec. 14, 34, 61, 68), at whose head was a president or mayor (Joseph. Vita, sec. 27 ; De Bell. "ild. 21. 3).—J. R. B.