The two terms spoil and booty are the appropriate words to use of enemy possessions that are seized by victorious troops after a battle. The animals were taken from the fields, and all the valuable articles in the houses were seized. In English the two words in this kind of context are exact synonyms, like “pillage” and “plunder.” Only indicates that this is an exception to the general statement in the previous verse. Whatever could not be carried away was usually destroyed, so that nothing was left.

Cattle or “livestock” (Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version) probably refers to not only cows and bulls (oxen), but sheep and goats (see also Exo 9.2-3). In cultures where cattle are unknown, we may employ a descriptive phrase such as “all domesticated animals.” It will also be helpful to include an illustration of these animals.

We took: some other verb may be more appropriate for taking the cattle; something like “we drove away the cattle” will be better in some languages.

With the booty of the cities may be expressed as “everything else of value in the towns that we captured.”

A possible alternative model is:

• We took all the domesticated animals and everything else of value in the towns we captured.

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Deuteronomy. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2000. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .