Patriarchal Narratives in Bronze Age Canaan

Genesis describes mobile pastoral households moving between Mesopotamia, Canaan and Egypt, negotiating access to wells and pasture, arranging marriages through kinship networks and building families around inheritance and divine promise. These details have often led artists and novelists to imagine the patriarchal stories within a Bronze Age setting.

Sarah’s infertility, Rebekah’s journey to marry Isaac, and the marriages of Leah and Rachel to Jacob place women at the centre of covenant, household rivalry and succession. Enslaved servants, bridewealth, polygyny and unequal authority are part of the social world that modern retellings must confront rather than idealise.

No precise archaeological chronology can be assigned to the individual patriarchs and matriarchs. The date range is a literary-historical framework for biblical fiction, not a claim that the events or life dates have been independently established.