House, houses
Archimandrite Nikifor’s Biblical Encyclopedia
(Exod. 12:7; Lev. 7:26). The most common dwellings from remote antiquity were undoubtedly tents, though Holy Scripture also repeatedly mentions caves (see Caves) as places of temporary residence or refuge. The simple mode of life then prevailing, the wandering, pastoral existence, and the favorable climate of the earliest inhabited regions of the globe made tents the most convenient dwelling; these were built, in various sizes and forms, generally in the following manner: posts or stakes were driven into the ground, and over them a covering of cloth or leather was stretched, fastened to the poles by ropes.