The duty of preparing bread was usually, in ancient times, committed to the females or the slaves of the family (Genesis 18:6; Leviticus 26:26; 1 Samuel 8:13); but at a later period we find a class of public bakers mentioned (Hosea 7:4, 6; Jeremiah 37:21).

The bread was generally in the form of long or round cakes (Exodus 29:23; 1 Samuel 2:36), of a thinness that rendered them easily broken (Isaiah 58:7; Matthew 14:19; 26:26; Acts 20:11). Common ovens were generally used; at other times a jar was half-filled with hot pebbles, and the dough was spread over them. Hence we read of "cakes baken on the coals" (1 Kings 19:6), and "baken in the oven" (Leviticus 2:4). (see BREAD.)

Noah Webster's New International Dictionary of the English Language

1. (v. t.) To prepare, as food, by cooking in a dry heat, either in an oven or under coals, or on heated stone or metal; as, to bake bread, meat, apples.

2. (v. t.) To dry or harden (anything) by subjecting to heat, as, to bake bricks; the sun bakes the ground.

3. (v. t.) To harden by cold.

4. (v. i.) To do the work of baking something; as, she brews, washes, and bakes.

5. (v. i.) To be baked; to become dry and hard in heat; as, the bread bakes; the ground bakes in the hot sun.

6. (n.) The process, or result, of baking.