Hebrew word · H1003
בִּירָנִית
biraniyot
fortress
Fortresses, citadels, fortified strongholds. It is a form of birah, 'fortress, citadel', which comes ultimately from Akkadian birtu, a fortified place or garrison stronghold.
Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·
What it means
fortress, fortified place
Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).
In depth
From the study of 2 Chronicles 17:12
- Range of meaning
Fortresses, citadels, fortified strongholds. It is a form of birah, 'fortress, citadel', which comes ultimately from Akkadian birtu, a fortified place or garrison stronghold.
- Against the English
KJV 'castles' and YLT 'palaces'. 'Castles' brings up medieval stone keeps with lords and moats. 'Palaces' suggests royal homes. Modern versions ('fortresses', 'forts') are closer: these were military and administrative strongholds.
- How it drifted
The KJV translators used 'castle' in its older general sense of a fortified place. Modern readers now hear the medieval picture. YLT's 'palaces' probably reflects older translation traditions that took birah as a grand building, since in Esther and Nehemiah birah is used of the royal citadel at Susa and the temple fortress in Jerusalem.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Birah appears mainly in late books: Neh 2:8; 7:2; Esth 1:2 ('Susa the citadel'); 1 Chr 29:1, 19 (of the temple). In Aramaic papyri of the Persian period, Elephantine in Egypt is called 'Yeb the fortress' (byrt'). The plural form biraniyyot occurs only here and in 2 Chr 27:4 (Jotham built fortresses and towers in the wooded hills). It is part of the Chronicler's late, Persian-period vocabulary.
Where it appears
2 Chronicles · 2
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2 Chronicles 17:12 בִּירָנִיּ֖וֹת fortresses
Jehoshaphat grew stronger and stronger, and he built fortresses and store cities in Judah
Here: A rare, late word (found only here and in 2 Chr 27:4). It means fortified strongholds, the kind of military and administrative forts used to control a region. These are not palaces or castles in the medieval sense.
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2 Chronicles 27:4 בִּֽירָנִיּ֖וֹת fortresses
He also built cities in the hill country of Judah and fortresses and towers in the forests.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.