Joshua 6:14-16

Amplified Bible, Classic Edition

¹⁴On the second day they compassed the city enclosure once and returned to the camp. So they did for six days.

¹⁵On the seventh day they rose early at daybreak and marched around the city as usual, only on that day they compassed the city ^[a]seven times.

¹⁶And the seventh time, when the priests had blown the trumpets, Joshua said to the people, Shout! For the Lord has given you the city.

Joshua 6:15 Any walled town was called a “city” and its headman was called “a king” in ancient times, but the fact that Joshua’s army could march around the whole of Jericho seven times in one day shows that it was a very small place. Sir Charles Marston (New Bible Evidence) echoes the reports of other archaeologists when he says that the excavations of ancient Jericho do not confirm the conceptions of our youth. Though the walls were so formidable, the area they enclosed only measures seven acres. The whole circumference of the city was about 650 yards. Our disappointment is somewhat modified by the fact that Jebusite Jerusalem, which David captured, was about the same size. Schliemann experienced a similar disillusionment in 1873 when he excavated the city of Troy, which Homer tells us so long withstood the Grecian hosts. Indeed it would almost seem that these ancient cities were more in the nature of places of refuge resorted to when an enemy approached. Under peaceful conditions a large proportion of the inhabitants would dwell outside the city’s walls (Sir Charles Marston, New Bible Evidence).