Bedouin “Settlement” in the Tell el-Hesi Region in the Late Islamic to British Mandate Period
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/jia.37242Keywords:
Agricultural, Bedouin, British Mandate Palestine, Diqs Family, Landscape, Sedentarization, Tell el-HesiAbstract
Combining historical sources with the survey data we document the Bedouin transition from pastoralism to an economy based more on agriculture than animal husbandry. The construction of structures, first baikas and later houses, is evidence for a presumed reduction in mobility. This shift towards an agricultural economy was in part facilitated by the Fellahin/villagers who were hired by the Bedouin to assist in the harvest. This shift and consequential decline in mobility, however, is voluntary and not a result of direct coercion by the Mandate government.
References
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Aharoni, Reuven. 2007. The Pasha’s Bedouin : Tribes and State in the Egypt of Mehemet Ali, 1805–1848. London: Routledge.
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Bailey, C. 2002. Bedouin Poetry from Sinai and the Negev. London: Saqi Books.
Banning, E. B. 1986. “Peasants, Pastoralists, and Pax Romana: Mutualism in the Southern Highlands of Jordan.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 261: 25–50. https://doi.org/10.2307/1357062
Barfield, T. J. 1993. The Nomadic Alternative. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Barton, G. A. 1904. A Year’s Wandering in Bible Lands. Philadelphia: Ferris and Leach.
Bliss, F. J. 1898 A Mound of Many Cities. 2nd edition. London: Palestine Exploration Fund.
Boas, A. 2000. “Pottery and small finds from the late Ottoman village and the early Zionist settlement.” In Ramat Hanadiv Excavations: Final Report of the 1984-1998 Seasons, edited by Y. Hirschfeld, 547–580. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society.
Brown, Robin M. 2014. “Palestinian Gaza Gray Ware vessels from the Late Ottoman period in the Semitic Museum, Harvard University.” Unpublished manuscript. Semitic Museum, Harvard, University, Cambridge, MA.
Canaani, Eliahu. 1981. Ruh?amah, ha-yishuv ha-Yehudi ha-rishon ba-Negev, 1912–1936 (RUHAMA - The First Jewish Settlement in the Negev, 1912–1936). Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi (Hebrew).
Conder, C. R. and H. H. Kitchener. 1880. Map of Western Palestine. London: Palestine Exploration Fund. Scale 1:63,360.
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Cytryn-Silverman, K. and J. A. Blakely. 2013. The kh?n at al-Sukkariyya: A station on the Gaza-Hebron route. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 369: 201–229. https://doi.org/10.5615/bullamerschoorie.369.0201
Dickson H. 1951 Arab of the Desert: A Glimpse into Bedouin Life in Kuwait. 2nd ed. London: George Allen & Unwin.
Diqs, I. 1967. A Bedouin Boyhood. New York: Universe Books.
Eakins, J. K. 1993 Tell el-Hesi: The Muslim Cemetery in Fields V and VI/IX (Stratum II). Tell el-Hesi 5. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.
Frantzman, S., N. Levin and R. Kark. 2013. “Counting nomads: British census attempts and tent counts of the Negev bedouin 1917 to 1948.” Population, Space and Place 20(6): 552–568. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/psp.1795
Gavish, D. 2005. The Survey of Palestine under the British Mandate, 1920-1948. New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203339558
Grossman, D. 1992. Rural Process-Pattern Relationships: Nomadization, Sedentarization, and Settlement Fixation. New York: Praeger.
----- 2004. Arab Demography and Early Jewish Settlement in Palestine: Distribution and Population Density during the Late Ottoman and Early Mandate Periods. Jerusalem: Magnes Press (Hebrew).
Guérin, V. 1869. Description géographiques, historique, et archéologique de la Palestine. Part 1 vol. 2, Judée. Paris.
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Kark, R. 1997. “The introduction of modern technology into the Holy Land (1800–1914 CE).” In The Archaeology of Society in the Holy Land, edited by T. E. Levy, 524–548. London and Washington: Leicester University Press.
Khalidi, W., ed. 1992. All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948. Washington, DC: Institute for Palestine Studies.
Köhler-Rollefson, Ilse. 1987. “Ethnoarchaeological research into the origins of pastoralism.” Annual of the Department of Anitiquities of Jordan 31: 535–539.
Lancaster, W. and F. Lancaster. 1988. “Thoughts on the Bedouinisation of Arabia.” Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 18: 51–62.
Layne, L. 1987 “Village-Bedouin: Patterns of change from mobility to sedentism in Jordan.” In Method and Theory for Activity Area Research: An Ethnoarchaeological Approach, edited by S. Kent, 345–373. New York: Columbia University Press.
Levin, N., R. Kark and E. Galilee. 2010. “Maps and the Settlement of Southern Palestine, 1799-1948: An Historical/GIS Analysis.” Journal of Historical Geography 36: 1-18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhg.2009.04.001
Luke, H. C. and E. Keith-Roach. 1922. The Handbook of Palestine. London: Macmillan.
Mayerson, P. 1989. “Saracens and Romans: Micro-macro relationships.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 274: 71–78. https://doi.org/10.2307/1357054
Meir, C. 2002. “The numismatic aspect: The coins origins and dates.” In Crown of Coins: Traditional Headdresses of Arab and Bedouin Women, edited by C. Meir, 13*-14*. Tel Aviv: Eretz Israel Museum.
Mizrahi, S. 2012. “Mevasseret Ziyyon/Horbat ‘En Telem (South): Final Report.” Excavations and Surveys in Israel 124. http://www.hadashotesi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=2049&mag_id=119
Nahshoni, P. 2008. “Samakh Caves/Nahal No?am: Final report.” Excavations and Surveys in Israel 120. http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=913&mag_id=114
Nasasra, M. 2015. Ruling the desert: Ottoman and British policies towards the bedouin of the Naqab and Transjordan region, 1900–1948. British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 42(3): 261–283. https://doi.org/10.1080/13530194.2015.1011452
Palestine Operations Trench Map: Falujeh 1918. Palestine Operations Trench Maps: Falujeh (Sheet A.2.). Palestine: 7th Field Service Company, Royal Engineers, Egyptian Expeditionary Force. Scale 1:40,000.
Paran, N.-S. 2008. Horbat Mador. Hadashot Arkheologiyot/Excavations and Surveys in Israel 120. http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=749&mag_id=114.
Parker, S. T. 1987. “Peasants, pastoralists, and Pax Romana: A different view.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 265: 35–51. https://doi.org/10.2307/1356805
Petrie, W. M. F. 1890. “Journal of Mr. W. M. Flinders Petrie.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 1890: 219–246. https://doi.org/10.1179/peq.1890.22.4.219
----- 1891. Tell el Hesy (Lachish). London: Palestine Exploration Fund.
Pick, W. P. 1990. “Meissner Pasha and the construction of railways in Palestine and neighboring countries.” In Ottoman Palestine, 1800–1914: Studies in Economic and Social History, edited by G. G. Gilbar, 179–218. Leiden: Brill.
Robinson, Edward. 1841. Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petræa, 2 vols. London: John Murray.
Saidel, B. A. 2011. “Adjusting the terminus ante quem of the red slipped and burnished disc-base tobacco pipes from Suba,
Israel.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 363: 73–94. https://doi.org/10.5615/bullamerschoorie.363.0073
Saidel, B. A., D. Gazit and T. Erickson-Gini. 2019. Al-?Obeidat structures in the Western Negev: An example of bedouin architecture from the British Mandate period in Israel. Israel Exploration Journal 69: 98–115.
Salem, H. 2009. “An ethno-archaeological approach to Ottoman pottery: The case of “Gaza Gray Ware.” In Reflections of
Empire: Archaeological and Ethnographic Studies on the Pottery of the Ottoman Levant, edited by B. Walker, 23–36. Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research 64. Boston, MA: American Schools of Oriental Research.
Schmitt, G. and P. Sindlinger. 1992. Palestine at around 1920 (Southern part) = Palastina um 1920 (Sudteil) B X 12. Wiesbaden: L. Reichert.
Simpson, St. J. 2000. “The clay pipes.” In Belmont Castle: The Excavations of a Crusader Stronghold in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, edited by R. Harper and D. Pringle, 147–171. British Academy Monographs in Archaeology 10. Oxford: Council for British Research in the Levant.
----- 2002. “Ottoman pipes from Zir?in (Tell Jezreel).” Levant 34: 159–172. https://doi.org/10.1179/lev.2002.34.1.159
----- 2008. “Late Ottoman pipes from Jerusalem.” In Excavations by K.M. Kenyon in Jerusalem 1961–1967 Volume V: Discoveries in Hellenistic to Ottoman Jerusalem. Centenary Volume: Kathleen M Kenyon 1906–1978, edited by K. Prag, 433–446. Oxford: Council for British Research in the Levant.
Spaer, M. 2001. Ancient Glass in the Israel Museum: Beads and Other Small Objects. Israel Museum Catalogue 447. Jerusalem: Israel Museum.
Taxel, I. 2009. “Stone, bone and metal objects.” In Khirbet Es-Suyyagh: Byzantine Monastery in the Judaean Shephelah, edited by I. Taxel, 152–165. Salvage Excavation Reports 6. Tel Aviv: Sonia and Marco Nadler Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University.
(Tell el-Quneitira) 1930. “Tell el-Quneitira , Report S.1124 of 5 March 1930. Mandate Site Files, vol. 154.” Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority Archives, Rockefeller Museum.
Toombs, L. E. 1985. Tell el-Hesi: Modern Military Trenching and Muslim Cemetery in Field I, Strata I-II, edited by K. G. O’Connell, S.J. Excavation Reports of the American Schools of Oriental Research: Tell el-Hesi 2. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
Yekutieli, Y. 2007. “Bet al-Malahi.” In On the Fringe of Society: Archaeological and Ethnoarchaeological Perspectives on Pastoral and Agricultural Societies, edited by B. A. Saidel and E. J. van der Steen, 127–138. British Archaeological Reports International Series 1657. Oxford: Archaeopress.
Yisraeli, Y. 2006. “The Black Gaza Ware from the Ottoman Period.” Unpublished PhD thesis, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
Agassi, M., J. Morin and I. Shainberg. 1982. “Laboratory studies of infiltration and runoff control in semi-arid soils in Israel.” Geoderma 28: 345–356. https://doi.org/10.1016/0016-7061(82)90009-X
Aharoni, Reuven. 2007. The Pasha’s Bedouin : Tribes and State in the Egypt of Mehemet Ali, 1805–1848. London: Routledge.
American Colony Photo Department. 1900–1920a. Costumes, Characters, etc. Bedouins Preparing Coffee in their Tent. Washington, DC. American Colony Photo Department LC-DIG-matpc-01315.
----- 1900–1920b. Costumes, characters, etc. Horse-shoes and nails. Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, G. Eric and Edith Matson Collection, Washington, DC. LC-DIG-matpc-05618.
----- 1925–1946. Native Blacksmith making Horseshoes. Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, G. Eric and Edith Matson Collection, Washington D.C. LC-DIG-matpc-13021.
Avitsur, S. 1976. Man and His Work: Historical Atlas of Tools and Workshops in the Holy Land. Jerusalem: Carta and the Israel Exploration Society. (Hebrew)
Bailey, C. 2002. Bedouin Poetry from Sinai and the Negev. London: Saqi Books.
Banning, E. B. 1986. “Peasants, Pastoralists, and Pax Romana: Mutualism in the Southern Highlands of Jordan.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 261: 25–50. https://doi.org/10.2307/1357062
Barfield, T. J. 1993. The Nomadic Alternative. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Barton, G. A. 1904. A Year’s Wandering in Bible Lands. Philadelphia: Ferris and Leach.
Bliss, F. J. 1898 A Mound of Many Cities. 2nd edition. London: Palestine Exploration Fund.
Boas, A. 2000. “Pottery and small finds from the late Ottoman village and the early Zionist settlement.” In Ramat Hanadiv Excavations: Final Report of the 1984-1998 Seasons, edited by Y. Hirschfeld, 547–580. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society.
Brown, Robin M. 2014. “Palestinian Gaza Gray Ware vessels from the Late Ottoman period in the Semitic Museum, Harvard University.” Unpublished manuscript. Semitic Museum, Harvard, University, Cambridge, MA.
Canaani, Eliahu. 1981. Ruh?amah, ha-yishuv ha-Yehudi ha-rishon ba-Negev, 1912–1936 (RUHAMA - The First Jewish Settlement in the Negev, 1912–1936). Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi (Hebrew).
Conder, C. R. and H. H. Kitchener. 1880. Map of Western Palestine. London: Palestine Exploration Fund. Scale 1:63,360.
----- 1883. The Survey of Western Palestine: Memoirs of the Topography, Orography, Hydrology, and Archaeology. Vol. 3, Judaea. London: Palestine Exploration Fund.
Cytryn-Silverman, K. and J. A. Blakely. 2013. The kh?n at al-Sukkariyya: A station on the Gaza-Hebron route. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 369: 201–229. https://doi.org/10.5615/bullamerschoorie.369.0201
Dickson H. 1951 Arab of the Desert: A Glimpse into Bedouin Life in Kuwait. 2nd ed. London: George Allen & Unwin.
Diqs, I. 1967. A Bedouin Boyhood. New York: Universe Books.
Eakins, J. K. 1993 Tell el-Hesi: The Muslim Cemetery in Fields V and VI/IX (Stratum II). Tell el-Hesi 5. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.
Frantzman, S., N. Levin and R. Kark. 2013. “Counting nomads: British census attempts and tent counts of the Negev bedouin 1917 to 1948.” Population, Space and Place 20(6): 552–568. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/psp.1795
Gavish, D. 2005. The Survey of Palestine under the British Mandate, 1920-1948. New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203339558
Grossman, D. 1992. Rural Process-Pattern Relationships: Nomadization, Sedentarization, and Settlement Fixation. New York: Praeger.
----- 2004. Arab Demography and Early Jewish Settlement in Palestine: Distribution and Population Density during the Late Ottoman and Early Mandate Periods. Jerusalem: Magnes Press (Hebrew).
Guérin, V. 1869. Description géographiques, historique, et archéologique de la Palestine. Part 1 vol. 2, Judée. Paris.
Huntington, E. 1911. Palestine and Its Transformation. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.
Kark, R. 1997. “The introduction of modern technology into the Holy Land (1800–1914 CE).” In The Archaeology of Society in the Holy Land, edited by T. E. Levy, 524–548. London and Washington: Leicester University Press.
Khalidi, W., ed. 1992. All That Remains: The Palestinian Villages Occupied and Depopulated by Israel in 1948. Washington, DC: Institute for Palestine Studies.
Köhler-Rollefson, Ilse. 1987. “Ethnoarchaeological research into the origins of pastoralism.” Annual of the Department of Anitiquities of Jordan 31: 535–539.
Lancaster, W. and F. Lancaster. 1988. “Thoughts on the Bedouinisation of Arabia.” Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 18: 51–62.
Layne, L. 1987 “Village-Bedouin: Patterns of change from mobility to sedentism in Jordan.” In Method and Theory for Activity Area Research: An Ethnoarchaeological Approach, edited by S. Kent, 345–373. New York: Columbia University Press.
Levin, N., R. Kark and E. Galilee. 2010. “Maps and the Settlement of Southern Palestine, 1799-1948: An Historical/GIS Analysis.” Journal of Historical Geography 36: 1-18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhg.2009.04.001
Luke, H. C. and E. Keith-Roach. 1922. The Handbook of Palestine. London: Macmillan.
Mayerson, P. 1989. “Saracens and Romans: Micro-macro relationships.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 274: 71–78. https://doi.org/10.2307/1357054
Meir, C. 2002. “The numismatic aspect: The coins origins and dates.” In Crown of Coins: Traditional Headdresses of Arab and Bedouin Women, edited by C. Meir, 13*-14*. Tel Aviv: Eretz Israel Museum.
Mizrahi, S. 2012. “Mevasseret Ziyyon/Horbat ‘En Telem (South): Final Report.” Excavations and Surveys in Israel 124. http://www.hadashotesi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=2049&mag_id=119
Nahshoni, P. 2008. “Samakh Caves/Nahal No?am: Final report.” Excavations and Surveys in Israel 120. http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=913&mag_id=114
Nasasra, M. 2015. Ruling the desert: Ottoman and British policies towards the bedouin of the Naqab and Transjordan region, 1900–1948. British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 42(3): 261–283. https://doi.org/10.1080/13530194.2015.1011452
Palestine Operations Trench Map: Falujeh 1918. Palestine Operations Trench Maps: Falujeh (Sheet A.2.). Palestine: 7th Field Service Company, Royal Engineers, Egyptian Expeditionary Force. Scale 1:40,000.
Paran, N.-S. 2008. Horbat Mador. Hadashot Arkheologiyot/Excavations and Surveys in Israel 120. http://www.hadashot-esi.org.il/report_detail_eng.aspx?id=749&mag_id=114.
Parker, S. T. 1987. “Peasants, pastoralists, and Pax Romana: A different view.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 265: 35–51. https://doi.org/10.2307/1356805
Petrie, W. M. F. 1890. “Journal of Mr. W. M. Flinders Petrie.” Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement 1890: 219–246. https://doi.org/10.1179/peq.1890.22.4.219
----- 1891. Tell el Hesy (Lachish). London: Palestine Exploration Fund.
Pick, W. P. 1990. “Meissner Pasha and the construction of railways in Palestine and neighboring countries.” In Ottoman Palestine, 1800–1914: Studies in Economic and Social History, edited by G. G. Gilbar, 179–218. Leiden: Brill.
Robinson, Edward. 1841. Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petræa, 2 vols. London: John Murray.
Saidel, B. A. 2011. “Adjusting the terminus ante quem of the red slipped and burnished disc-base tobacco pipes from Suba,
Israel.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 363: 73–94. https://doi.org/10.5615/bullamerschoorie.363.0073
Saidel, B. A., D. Gazit and T. Erickson-Gini. 2019. Al-?Obeidat structures in the Western Negev: An example of bedouin architecture from the British Mandate period in Israel. Israel Exploration Journal 69: 98–115.
Salem, H. 2009. “An ethno-archaeological approach to Ottoman pottery: The case of “Gaza Gray Ware.” In Reflections of
Empire: Archaeological and Ethnographic Studies on the Pottery of the Ottoman Levant, edited by B. Walker, 23–36. Annual of the American Schools of Oriental Research 64. Boston, MA: American Schools of Oriental Research.
Schmitt, G. and P. Sindlinger. 1992. Palestine at around 1920 (Southern part) = Palastina um 1920 (Sudteil) B X 12. Wiesbaden: L. Reichert.
Simpson, St. J. 2000. “The clay pipes.” In Belmont Castle: The Excavations of a Crusader Stronghold in the Kingdom of Jerusalem, edited by R. Harper and D. Pringle, 147–171. British Academy Monographs in Archaeology 10. Oxford: Council for British Research in the Levant.
----- 2002. “Ottoman pipes from Zir?in (Tell Jezreel).” Levant 34: 159–172. https://doi.org/10.1179/lev.2002.34.1.159
----- 2008. “Late Ottoman pipes from Jerusalem.” In Excavations by K.M. Kenyon in Jerusalem 1961–1967 Volume V: Discoveries in Hellenistic to Ottoman Jerusalem. Centenary Volume: Kathleen M Kenyon 1906–1978, edited by K. Prag, 433–446. Oxford: Council for British Research in the Levant.
Spaer, M. 2001. Ancient Glass in the Israel Museum: Beads and Other Small Objects. Israel Museum Catalogue 447. Jerusalem: Israel Museum.
Taxel, I. 2009. “Stone, bone and metal objects.” In Khirbet Es-Suyyagh: Byzantine Monastery in the Judaean Shephelah, edited by I. Taxel, 152–165. Salvage Excavation Reports 6. Tel Aviv: Sonia and Marco Nadler Institute of Archaeology, Tel Aviv University.
(Tell el-Quneitira) 1930. “Tell el-Quneitira , Report S.1124 of 5 March 1930. Mandate Site Files, vol. 154.” Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority Archives, Rockefeller Museum.
Toombs, L. E. 1985. Tell el-Hesi: Modern Military Trenching and Muslim Cemetery in Field I, Strata I-II, edited by K. G. O’Connell, S.J. Excavation Reports of the American Schools of Oriental Research: Tell el-Hesi 2. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
Yekutieli, Y. 2007. “Bet al-Malahi.” In On the Fringe of Society: Archaeological and Ethnoarchaeological Perspectives on Pastoral and Agricultural Societies, edited by B. A. Saidel and E. J. van der Steen, 127–138. British Archaeological Reports International Series 1657. Oxford: Archaeopress.
Yisraeli, Y. 2006. “The Black Gaza Ware from the Ottoman Period.” Unpublished PhD thesis, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
Published
2019-09-18
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Articles
How to Cite
Saidel, B., & Blakely, J. (2019). Bedouin “Settlement” in the Tell el-Hesi Region in the Late Islamic to British Mandate Period. Journal of Islamic Archaeology, 6(1), 19-39. https://doi.org/10.1558/jia.37242
