{"id":33,"date":"2018-10-10T11:16:59","date_gmt":"2018-10-10T11:16:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/projects.history.qmul.ac.uk\/ruralsocietyislam\/?page_id=33"},"modified":"2019-05-01T21:41:28","modified_gmt":"2019-05-01T21:41:28","slug":"i-1-the-village","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/projects.history.qmul.ac.uk\/ruralsocietyislam\/database\/i-1-the-village\/","title":{"rendered":"1. The Village"},"content":{"rendered":"

Throughout the Villages of the Fayyum<\/em>, the village as a unit of agricultural production is called n\u0101\u1e25iya<\/em>. The n\u0101\u1e25iya<\/em> was the administrative building block for the allocation of land and water resources and payment of taxes. When referring to the physical space of the village, al-N\u0101bulus\u012b usually uses the terms balad or balda.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

Hamlets (kafr<\/em>, pl. kuf\u016br<\/em>; also called munsha\u02bea<\/em>, pl. man\u0101shi\u02be<\/em>) were smaller settlements, whose taxes were normally subsumed under the tax-entry of a mother village. A\u00a0list of the man\u0101shi\u02be<\/em>, organized by their mother villages, is provided towards the end of the treatise. Hamlets were also dependent on a mother village for their water quota. Some hamlets paid alms-tax on livestock separately from their mother village, even if all other taxes, including the land-tax, were paid jointly.<\/p>\n

Fiscal Revenue and Iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf<\/h3>\n

Most of the villages in the Fayyum were assigned to holders of iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf<\/em> grants. The holders of the iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf grants were officers in the Ayyubid army who had temporary rights to the fiscal revenue (irtif\u0101\u02bf<\/em>) in the village in return for providing military service.<\/p>\n

The fiscal revenue allocated to iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf<\/em>-holders normally included the land-tax, both in cash and in kind, and the commercial taxes. The remaining taxes, including the alms-tax on livestock, the poll-tax on non-Muslims, and fees on the use of pasture, went to the state treasury, the D\u012bw\u0101n al-M\u0101l.\u00a0The D\u012bw\u0101n al-M\u0101l also owned the sugarcane plantations and presses.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

A handful of villages were not granted to iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf<\/em>-holders. Most prominently, these were three large villages that belonged to the private domain (kh\u0101\u1e63\u1e63<\/em>) of the Sultan. In these three villages the Sultan had a personal right to the fiscal revenue, paralleling those of iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf-holders in other villages.<\/p>\n

In addition, three small villages and some individual orchards were endowed as waqf for the benefit of religious institutions, both in Cairo and in Mad\u012bnat al-Fayyum. This meant that their fiscal revenues were channelled for the support of the endowed institution.<\/p>\n

Fiscal Value<\/h3>\n

When a village (or, sometimes, a group of villages) was granted as iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf<\/em>, it was accorded a fiscal value (\u02bfibra<\/em>), designated in a nominal unit of account known as Army Dinar (d\u012bn\u0101r jaysh\u012b<\/em>). The Army Dinar was supposed to create a standard measure of the income an iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf<\/em> unit was expected to generate, which could then be matched with the rank of the recipient of the iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Ibn Mamm\u0101t\u012b states that the Army Dinar was calculated by adding the expected income in ardabbs of grain to the cash revenue, in gold dinars, multiplied by four. Al-Qalqashand\u012b explains that under the Ayyubids each Army Dinar was worth three gold dinars.[3]<\/a> In the Villages of the Fayyum, however, the value of the Army Dinar is not standard.<\/p>\n

Iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf units usually consisted of a single village, but an iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf unit could also consist of a cluster of villages, mostly along the same irrigation canal. The largest clusters of this kind were the Dilya Canal, in south-western Fayyum, which included twelve different villages, and the Tanab\u1e6dawayh Canal, also in the south. In villages that formed part of these multi-village iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf units, the fiscal value mentioned is of the total iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf unit to which the village belonged.<\/p>\n

Bedouin and Non-tribal (badw<\/em> and \u1e25a\u1e0dar<\/em>)<\/h3>\n

Nearly all villages and hamlets in the Fayyum were inhabited by Arab tribesmen, also called badw, or Bedouin. Each village was identified with a tribal section or clan. While the Arabs were the inhabitants in most villages, a handful of villages were inhabited by predominantly non-tribal, or clan-less (\u1e25a\u1e0dar) population. In these villages, the Bedouin were the guardsmen or protectors (khufar\u0101\u02be).<\/p>\n

The segmentary tribal structure is described by al-N\u0101bulus\u012b in his introductory chapters. At the top level were three tribal confederacies (a\u1e63l or \u0101l), each inhabiting a large number of villages. First in importance were the Ban\u016b Kil\u0101b, with as many as fifty villages, followed by the Ban\u016b \u02bfAjl\u0101n and the much smaller Law\u0101ta, a Berber tribe. The Ban\u016b Kil\u0101b dominated in the centre, south, and west; the \u02bfAjl\u0101n in the east and the north; while the Law\u0101ta dwelt in villages along the al-L\u0101h\u016bn gap.<\/p>\n

Each tribal confederacy was divided into sections or clans, which al-N\u0101bulus\u012b usually calls fakhdh (pl., afkh\u0101dh) or \u2018branch\u2019 (far\u02bf). Each tribal section inhabited a varying number of settlements, from one hamlet (the Ban\u016b Mu\u1e6dayr in Sanh\u016br) to as many as nineteen villages (the Ban\u016b Zar\u02bfa of the \u02bfAjl\u0101n). The individual village entries nearly always identify the people of the village (ahl) with one particular clan. In the minority of villages where the population is clan-less, the entry identifies the Arab clan that holds the protection rights.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Map: Tribes and clans<\/p><\/div>\n

Water Rights<\/h3>\n

Most villages were irrigated by gravity-fed canals and were allocated \u2018water rights\u2019, effectively a water quota, determined by the width of the weir at the head of a local feeder canal. Some villages were fed by more than one canal, and then al-N\u0101bulus\u012b lists the water rights for each of these canals separately.<\/p>\n

The width of the opening of the weir at the head of the feeder canal was measured in units called qab\u1e0da, literally \u2018fist-length\u2019 (approximately 10\u00a0cm). A\u00a0qab\u1e0da unit may have also taken into account the slope of the canal or its depth.[4]<\/a> The water quota of an individual village was taken out of the total water quota of the main branch canal for the surrounding area.<\/p>\n

Where a main canal branched off to several feeder canals, each governed by a separate weir, the cluster of weirs was called a divider (maqsam, pl. maq\u0101sim). These dividers were found only on the Grand Canal and major branch canals, called the ba\u1e25rs.<\/p>\n

Villages outside of the Fayyum depression itself, mostly north and south of the al-L\u0101h\u016bn dam, were irrigated in the \u2018manner of the Lower Egypt (al-r\u012bf)\u2019, that is, by basin irrigation. Villages irrigated by basin irrigation did not have a water quota.[5]<\/a><\/p>\n

Some villages irrigated by gravity-fed canals also did not have a water quota. This was particularly true for villages lying on higher ground, because the flow in their feeder canal was considered to be too weak and there was no need to regulate it.<\/p>\n

Religious Buildings<\/h3>\n

Al-N\u0101bulus\u012b relied on a record of churches, monasteries, and mosques in the Fayyum held in Cairo by the Ministry of Endowments of Congregational and Neighbourhood Mosques (D\u012bw\u0101n A\u1e25b\u0101s al-Jaw\u0101mi\u02bf wa\u2019l-Mas\u0101jid<\/em>), usually abbreviated to the Ministry of Endowments.[6]<\/a> Al-N\u0101bulus\u012b also notes the existence of some unregistered mosques not on the Ministry\u2019s list, usually in smaller villages or hamlets.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Map: Active churches and monasteries<\/p><\/div>\n

Spreadsheet I – The Village<\/a><\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Here we differ from Sato, who identifies the balda<\/em> as the administrative unit for the iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf: Sato, State and Rural Society<\/em>, p.\u00a0179.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Later, in 1315, the collection of the poll-tax was handed over to the iq\u1e6d\u0101\u02bf-holders: see Rabie, The Financial System<\/em>, p.\u00a041; Sato, State and Rural Society<\/em>, pp.\u00a068, 148.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Ibn Mamm\u0101t\u012b, Kit\u0101b qaw\u0101n\u012bn al-daw\u0101w\u012bn<\/em>, ed. by \u02bfA\u1e6diya, p.\u00a0369; al-Qalqashand\u012b, \u1e62ub\u1e25<\/em>, iii, 442\u201343; Sato, State and Rural Society<\/em>, pp.\u00a0153\u201355; Rabie, The Financial System<\/em>, p.\u00a047; Cooper, \u2018Ibn Mammati\u2019s Rules\u2019, pp.\u00a0364\u201367. Stuart Borsch adopts the 1:3 ratio mentioned by al-Qalqashand\u012b: Borsch, The Black Death in Egypt and England: A\u00a0Comparative Study<\/em> (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2009), pp.\u00a067\u201390.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> A reference to \u2018small qab\u1e0das\u2019 (quba\u1e0d \u1e63igh\u0101r<\/em>, in B\u016br S\u012bnar\u016b) suggests that the unit was not uniform.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> These are Band\u012bq and Dim\u016bh al-D\u0101thir. See also the discussion by John Ball, Contributions to the Geography of Egypt<\/em> (Cairo: The Government Press, 1939), p.\u00a0220.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> This ministry had much discretion over the appointment and reimbursement of religious officials, such as scholars, Qur\u2019an readers and imams. See al-N\u0101bulus\u012b, Luma\u02bf<\/em>, ed.\u00a0by Becker and Cahen, pp.\u00a025\u201327.<\/p>\n