Village, or Settlement
Archimandrite Nikifor’s Biblical Encyclopedia
(Lev. 25:29, 31; Josh. 15:46 and elsewhere)—a group of houses or dwellings without surrounding walls, in contrast to a fortified city. Scripture often mentions villages alongside cities. The source explains that they began as temporary huts, gradually became permanent and more closely built dwellings, and thus developed into villages in the proper sense. Because they stood in open country, they could also be called small unwalled towns (Deut. 3:5).