How common was polygamy in Biblical times?

Question

How prevalent was polygamy among Jews in Biblical times?

I can only think of five Jews in Tanach who had multiple wives: Avraham, Yaakov, Elkanah, David, and Shlomo (although I probably missed a few). However, Avraham didn't marry Hagar until Sarah asked him to do so because of her infertility, and David and Shlomo were kings, so maybe they were unique in this regard.

Other well-known figures like Yitzchak, Yosef, Amram, Moshe, and so on have only one wife mentioned.

So was polygamy the exception or the rule in Biblical times? Did many or most Jewish men have multiple wives, or was this a rare, though permitted, occurance?

@Ypnypn, Esav was a Jew (in the same sense that Yitzchak, Yosef and Amram were, anyway). Kiddushin 18a. — Yishai, May 11 '14 at 19:07
@Scimonster, although the eminent scholar Double AA suggested this here, I don't think there is any quotable source which thinks he was married to two wives at the same time. — Yishai, May 12 '14 at 20:07
@Scimonster, unless you intention was Double AA's comment, I'm wondering if you have an actual source which says it at all. — Yishai, May 13 '14 at 10:47
@Scimonster, you mean this one? It doesn't suggest they were simultaneous, rather one after the other. — Yishai, May 13 '14 at 19:06

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered May 11 '14 at 14:30

It seems that polygamy was relatively rare.

One reason may have been that each wife had to be given their own household - in their own house - as the Rambam write in Hil. Ishus 14:4:

נושא אדם כמה נשים, אפילו מאה, בין בבת אחת, בין בזו אחר זו; ואין אשתו יכולה לעכב עליו: והוא שיהיה יכול ליתן שאר כסות ועונה, כראוי לכל אחת ואחת. ואינו יכול לכוף אותן לשכון בחצר אחת, אלא כל אחת ואחת לעצמה

Thus, multiple wives meant being rather wealthy.

We see multiple times in the Talmud that it was assumed one only married one wife; offhand I can't think of a good example, yet.

Note that the term for a co-wife in Hebrew is צרה - lit. trouble - and co-wives were assumed to hate each other - to the extent that we assume they scheme against each other. For example, they cannot be trusted to report their husband died - as we assume they are scheming against the co-wife to get her to remarry and thus forbid her to her husband.

Doesn't צרה literally mean 'bound [together]', like צררות בשמלותם על שכמם? — Double AA, Sep 17 '15 at 20:40
@DoubleAA שמואל א - מצודת ציון-שמואל א פרק-א פסוק ו - צרתה . שתי נשים מאיש אחד תקראנה צרות , והוא מלשון צר ואויב , כי על פי רוב שונאות זו לזו — Danny Schoemann, Sep 20 '15 at 08:53
The Rambam doesn't say that each wife HAD to be given their own household, just that he couldn't FORCE them to live together in the same courtyard. That implies that if they agreed to such an arrangement, of living all together in the same courtyard, it would be OK halachically. — IsraelReader, May 14 '23 at 22:46

How common was polygamy in Biblical times?

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