Biblica_1:Layout 1 21-11-2011 12:59 Pagina 326 326 MARK LEUCHTER spective, a state could form without a large centralized power struc- ture or urban-based economy. Instead, a central locus of authority could insinuate itself into decentralized rural systems founded upon kinship structures, creating new dynamics of allegiance and socio- economic affiliation 20. Such a state model derives from extant systems of lineage/kinship and socio-economic interaction between them already in place throughout the hinterland, and which remained as such even as a state emerged as a discernible sociological entity 21. Centralization and ur- banized economy, as defined by Jamieson-Drake, constitutes only one form of a state, one that admittedly emerges in late 8th century BCE Judah but which does not preclude other, earlier manifestations of a state. Rather, the literary, anthropological and archaeological evidence pertaining to the Iron I-IIa periods points to the shift from chiefdoms to a state in a rudimentary form by the Iron IIa period 22, and one that grew into the standards identified by Jamieson-Drake in the Iron IIb period. The ramifications of the foregoing are that one can speak of royal scribes in periods before the late 8th century BCE, and indeed there are grounds for seeing resources for scribalism surfacing even before this time. Certainly, the recent discoveries of the Tel Zayit and Tel Qeyeifah inscriptions indicate that literacy — while not wide- spread by any means — was alive and well in the 10th century BCE 23. logical Research and American Schools of Oriental Research, Jerusalem, May 29-31, 2000 (eds. W.G. DEVER – S. GITTIN) (Winona Lake, IN 2003) 63-73. 20 STAGER, “Patrimonial Kingdom”. 21 HALPERN, “Jerusalem and the Lineages”, 59-75, notes that the clan sys- tem remained intact at least down to the reforms of Hezekiah but suffered thereafter. As I have noted elsewhere, however, clan integrity is evident in later periods as well, as suggested by the reflections upon lineage diversity in the Book of Jeremiah, cf. M. LEUCHTER, “The ‘Prophets’ and the ‘Levites’ in Josiah’s Covenant Ceremony”, ZAW 121 (2009) 36-44. 22 For an overview of factors leading to this type of state, see C. MEYERS, “Kinship and Kingship: The Early Monarchy”, The Oxford History of the Biblical World (ed. M.D. COOGAN) (New York – Oxford 1998) 178-183. 23 As of this writing, very little has been published regarding the Khirbet Qeyeifah inscription beyond the fact that it was discovered in situ in an early to mid 10th century stratum and that it incorporates some language suggesting a royal administration. For a consideration of the inscription’s impact upon a reconstruc- tion of 11th-10th century Israelite sociology, see J.M. HUTTON, The Transjordanian Palimpsest. The Overwritten Texts of Personal Exile and Transformation in the Deuteronomistic History (BZAW 396; Berlin 2009) 170.