A possible implication of Matthew 5:15 is that houses generally had only one room:
15Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. ESV
Does archeology support this in general, or do we need to look for another way to interpret Jesus words here (e.g. all in the house get light from the lamp when they happen to be in the room where it is placed)?
A typical 1st century family home in Palestine was not one room but several rooms, on one or two floors, around a common open courtyard. Each room opened to the central space, so one lampstand in the central courtyard could shine into all the rooms of the house.
The courtyard architectural type is well documented. The Neolithic site of Sha'ar HaGolan on the southern end of the Sea of Galilee has the oldest known example in the world, dating from 8,000 years ago. The classic four-room house of Israel’s Iron Age is another simple example, though by the time of Jesus, explains Wofford College’s Bryan McCane, the layout of the four-room house had changed:
“At Gamla, Yodfat, Capernaum, Khirbet Qana, and Sepphoris, excavated houses from the Early Roman period consist of a cluster of rooms around a courtyard and/or work area. Most of the rooms around the courtyard were used as bedrooms and/or storage. The arrangement of rooms is organic – new rooms were added when needed, as space permitted. Like their four-roomed predecessors, these Early Roman houses were well suited for habitation by extended family groups. Several houses at Sepphoris also include a mikveh, or ritual bath.”
Many large, richly decorated courtyard homes of the period have been unearthed throughout the ancient Greek and Roman world. Archaeological sites in Galilee display both lavish and modest examples. Perhaps this is what Jesus had in mind.
There are plenty of Biblical and archaeological evidence that even lower class people had houses of more than one room. The famous 1st century remains of a house in Capernaum is said to be the house of Simon Peter:
Peter was a lead fisherman along with his younger brother Andrews and might have had a good business as such, hence he could have most likely afforded a house like the one said to have belonged to him. This house has a couple of rooms, kitchen, small patio and guest room where most likely Jesus healed Peter's mother in law (Mark 1:29-31). Other passages suggest that common houses had more than one room like when Peter asks to be left alone with Tabitha and the others left that particular room(Acts 9:36-43).
Although I could admit to the possibility that there were homes of an one-room nature in Israel at the time of Jesus, especially when the occupants of a particular dwelling were poor, it certainly was not a universal norm. Jesus himself asked his disciples to prepare the Last Supper in the "Upper Room." (Luke 22: 10-13). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cenacle On October 18, 1881 two missionaries discovered what is commonly believed, in some Catholic circles, to be the House of the Virgin Mary. Whether this is true or false is not in question here. What is important is that this dwelling dates back to the 1st century and had at least two rooms. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_the_Virgin_Mary
There is an enormous amount of archaeological evidence for houses in the Near East 2000 years ago, and indeed 4000 or 6000 years ago. There is absolutely no reason to think "that houses generally had only one room" during the Roman period. I think you are taking the passage in Matthew excessively literally.
