Between Rocks and ‘High Places’: On Religious Architecture in the Iron Age Southern Levant

Abstract

In this paper we examine why common methodologies for determining ‘religious architecture’ do not account for the diverse and fluid ways in which religious behavior can be expressed. We focus on religious architecture from the Iron Age Southern Levant highlighting certain sites that ‘fall through the cracks’ of current taxonomies. We propose a different way of approaching evidence for religious practice in the archaeological record, viewing religion as one dimension of social action made visible along a spectrum of ritualization.

Keywords

• religion
• architecture
• Iron Age
• Southern Levant