15 THE ISRAELITE-JUDAHITE STRUGGLE hand — such as the highlands of Judah, the Beersheba Valley and the Upper Shephelah — were largely peripheral and sparsely populated until the late 9th century BCE. The Northern Kingdom was a multifaceted state, comprising a heterogeneous population of diversified ethnic origin and cultic and cultural traditions, including many descendants of the former Canaanite population. No wonder, therefore, that it absorbed many religious concepts and cultic and cultural elements of Canaanite origin. Moreover, Israel bordered culturally influential kingdoms such as Aram Damascus and Tyre, and gradually absorbed cultic and cultural elements from its neighbours. Judah, on the other hand, was demographically quite homogenous, made up of settled local groups with pastoral roots. It was much more isolated, having a common border with only the two continental Philistine kingdoms of Ekron and Gath. Well until the 8th century, it lagged in all aspects of state organization and urban culture far behind its northern neighbour 38. During the 9th century several major cities in the Northern Kingdom were fortified (Hazor, Megiddo, Rehob, Jokneam, Jezreel, Dor and Gezer) and palaces as well as other public structures erected. By the 9th century the kingdom had evolved into what sociologists call a “mature state”: a well-developed territorial- political entity, with a settlement system comprising hundreds of settlements of various sizes. Not surprisingly, Israel is mentioned quite prominently in 9th century royal inscriptions of the kings of Assyria (Shalmaneser III, Adad-nirari III), Aram (Hazael) and Moab (Mesha). By contrast, only a few dozen small, indigent settlements occupied the territory of Judah in the 9th century. Excavations in the City of David in Jerusalem have revealed scant traces of settlement during this period. That said, we must not forget the formidable challenges of excavating such a mountainous site, which has been Ancient Israel, and Their Neighbors from the Late Bronze Age through Roman Palaestina. Proceedings of the Centennial Symposium, W.F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research and American Schools of Oriental Research, Jerusalem, May 29-31, 2000 (eds. W.G. DEVER – S. GITIN) (Winona Lake, IN 2003) 75-83. I. FINKELSTEIN, “State Formation in Israel and Judah: A Contrast in 38 Context, a Contrast in Trajectory”, NEA 62 (1999) 39-44.