What kind of house might Abram (Abraham) have lived in?

▪ Abram and his wife lived in the prosperous Chaldean city of Ur. But at God’s direction, they left that city and began dwelling in tents. (Genesis 11:31; 13:12) Consider what a sacrifice this change may have involved for them.

Ur, in modern-day Iraq, was excavated by Leonard Woolley between 1922 and 1934. Among the buildings he found were some 73 houses built of brick. The rooms of many of these houses were arranged around a paved central courtyard. The courtyard sloped gently toward its center, where a drain eliminated waste water. In the larger houses, guest rooms had their own lavatories. Other rooms on the ground floor included kitchens with fireplaces and slaves’ sleeping quarters. The family lived on the upper level, which was accessed by a staircase. The stairs led to a wooden balcony that ran around the courtyard and permitted access to the doors of the upper rooms.

“A house . . . , with its paved court and neatly whitewashed walls, its own system of drainage, . . . of a dozen rooms or more, implies a standard of life of a really high order,” wrote Woolley. “And these are the houses . . . of the middle class, shopkeepers, petty merchants, scribes, and so on.”

[Picture on page 19]

Drawing of a house from the time of Abraham

[Credit Line]

© Drawing: A. S. Whitburn