Burqin, Palestine

Burqin ( ar, برقين) is a Palestinian town in the northern West Bank located 5 km west of Jenin. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) census, its population was 5,685 in 2007.2007 Locality Population Statistics
. Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. p. 105. The majority of Burqin's residents are Muslims, and 20 Christian families live in the town. The Byzantine-era Burqin Church or St. George's Church is one of the oldest churches in the world.

History

Burqin is an ancient site, situated on a slope, with old stones reused in the town houses.

It was mentioned under the name ''Burqana'', in the 14th century BCE Amarna letters, as one of several cities conquered by the Canaanite warlord Lab'ayu in the Dothan Valley and southern Jezreel Valley.Goren et al., 2004
p. 262
Zertal, 2004, pp
104

105
/ref>

Pottery sherds from the Early Bronze I, Early Bronze IIB, Late Bronze III, Iron Age I, Iron Age II, late Roman, Byzantine, Umayyad/Abbasid, Medieval and early Ottoman era have been found.

Ottoman era

In 1517, the village was included in the Ottoman Empire with the rest of Palestine, and in the 1596 tax-records it appeared as ''Bruqin'', located in the ''Nahiya'' of Jabal Sami of the '' Liwa'' of Nablus. The population was 23 households and 4 bachelors, all Muslim. They paid a tax rate of 33.3% on agricultural products, which included wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, occasional revenues, goats and beehives; a total of 7980 akçe.

In 1799, Pierre Jacotin placed the village, named ''Berkin'', nearly straight west of Jenin on his map.Noted in 1838 by Edward Robinson; according to Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, p.
159
/ref> In 1838 Edward Robinson placed Burqin as being in the District of Jenin, also called "Haritheh esh-Shemaliyeh".

In 1863, when Victor Guérin visited, he found the village to have about 1,000 inhabitants, all Muslim with the exception of 90 Greek Orthodox Christians. He further noted that "Some 30 excavated cisterns are evidence that this village sits upon an ancient settlement."

In 1872, Claude Reignier Conder visited Burqin during his surveying work in Palestine. He was met by the local curé and shown the church. It had a stone screen on the east, shutting off three apses.

In 1882, the PEF's ''Survey of Western Palestine'' described ''Burkin'' as "A village of Greek Christians, with a small modern church for the Greek rite. It stands on the side of a white hill, with a good well below on the north, and olives near it."

British Mandate era

In the 1922 census of Palestine, conducted by the British Mandate authorities, ''Burqin'' had a population of 883; 871 Muslims and 12 Christians males,Barron, 1923, Table IX, Sub-district of Jenin, p
30
/ref> where all the Christians were Orthodox. This had increased in the 1931 census to a population of 1,086; 1,010 Muslim and 76 Christians, in a total of 227 inhabited houses.Mills, 1932, p
67
/ref>

In the 1945 statistics the population were 1,540; 1,430 Muslims and 110 Christians,Government of Palestine, Department of Statistics, 1945, p
16
with a total of 19,447 dunams of land, according to an official land and population survey. Of this, 3,902 dunams were used for plantations and irrigable land, 11,219 dunams for cereals, while 36 dunams were built-up (urban) land.

File:Burqin 1943.jpg, Burqin 1943 1:20,000
File:Biddya 1945.jpg, Burqin 1945 1:250,000

Jordanian era

In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements

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