Mazra'a ( ar, المزرعة, he, מַזְרַעָה) is an

Arab The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Western Asia, ...

town and local council in northern

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, situated between

Acre The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial and US customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one chain by one furlong (66 by 660 feet), which is exactly equal to 10 square chains, of a square mile, 4,840 square ...

and Nahariyya east of the Coastal Highway that runs along the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...

coast. The local council was founded in 1896 and was incorporated into the Matte Asher Regional Council in 1982, before proclaiming itself an independent local council again in 1996. In it had a population of .

Etymology

The

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

''al-mazra'a'' (p. ''mazari), meaning "the sown land" or "farm", is a relatively common

place name Place may refer to: Geography * Place (United States Census Bureau), defined as any concentration of population ** Census-designated place, a populated area lacking its own municipal government * "Place", a type of street or road name ** Of ...

used to refer to cultivated lands outside of and dependent upon a primary settlement.Pringle, 1998, p
30
In Crusader times, the village was known as ''le Mezera'', according to

Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (15 September 1821 – 21 Septembe 1890) was a French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included Greece, Asia Min ...

, while to

Arabs The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Western Asia, ...

in medieval times, it was known as ''al-Mazra'ah''.Guérin, 1880, p
163

History

In 1253, during the Crusader era, John Aleman, the Lord of Caesarea, leased Mazra'a to the Hospitalliers. Mazra'a is mentioned in the 1283

treaty A treaty is a formal, legally binding written agreement between actors in international law. It is usually made by and between sovereign states, but can include international organizations, individuals, business entities, and other legal per ...

between the Mamluk Sultan Qalaun and the Latin Kingdom of the

Crusaders The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were in ...

that controlled some territories in the

Levant The Levant () is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean region of Western Asia. In its narrowest sense, which is in use today in archaeology and other cultural contexts, it is ...

between 1099 and 1291. At the time of the treaty, Mazra'a was said to be still under

control. A 50 metre long wall to the west of the village centre, dating from the period, is thought to be the remnants of a fortified structure, mentioned by travel writers.Pringle, 1997, p
70
/ref>

Ottoman Empire

Mazra'a was incorporated into the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

in 1517 with all of Palestine and in 1596, the tax registers listed Mazra'a as forming part of the ''

nahiya A nāḥiyah ( ar, , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level division w ...

'' (subdistrict) of Acca (Acre). The population is recorded as 27

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

households, and the villagers paid a fixed tax-rate of 25% on

wheat Wheat is a grass widely cultivated for its seed, a cereal grain that is a worldwide staple food. The many species of wheat together make up the genus ''Triticum'' ; the most widely grown is common wheat (''T. aestivum''). The archaeologi ...

barley Barley (''Hordeum vulgare''), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains, particularly in Eurasia as early as 10,000 years ago. Globally 70% of barley p ...

cotton Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor pe ...

, in addition to "occasional revenues," goats, beehives, and water buffaloes; a total of 5,352

akçe The ''akçe'' or ''akça'' (also spelled ''akche'', ''akcheh''; ota, آقچه; ) refers to a silver coin which was the chief monetary unit of the Ottoman Empire. The word itself evolved from the word "silver or silver money", this word is der ...

. 14/24 of the revenue went to a

waqf A waqf ( ar, وَقْف; ), also known as hubous () or '' mortmain'' property is an inalienable charitable endowment under Islamic law. It typically involves donating a building, plot of land or other assets for Muslim religious or charitab ...

. In the 1760s, Mazra'a was one of five villages in ''

'' ("subdistrict") of ''Sahil Akka'' ("Acre coast"), which was under the direct rule of Zahir al-Umar, the independent governor of the

Galilee Galilee (; he, הַגָּלִיל, hagGālīl; ar, الجليل, al-jalīl) is a region located in northern Israel and southern Lebanon. Galilee traditionally refers to the mountainous part, divided into Upper Galilee (, ; , ) and Lower Gali ...

, as one of his Viftlik estates. As such, villagers were exempt from paying the usual Ottoman taxes. (Other Viftlik estates were Judayda, Samiriyya, al-Makr, and Julis.) After the death of Zahir al-Umar in 1775, these villages were abandoned for a time, becoming known as places of lawlessness. Jezzar Pasha, the new governor of

, first returned the villages to their local sheiks, later dividing the income collected from them between himself and the local official. AcreNE1799

A map by

Pierre Jacotin Pierre Jacotin (1765–1827) was the director of the survey for the '' Carte de l'Égypte (Description de l'Égypte)'', the first triangulation-based map of Egypt, Syria and Palestine. The maps were surveyed in 1799-1800 during the campaign in ...

from Napoleon's invasion of 1799 showed the place, named as ''El Masar,'' while

Napoleon Bonaparte Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader wh ...

himself described El-Mazara as a village of hundreds of Christians.

, who visited the place in 1875, described ''Mezra'a'' as a village with a very small number of inhabitants, sepulchral grottos,

cistern A cistern (Middle English ', from Latin ', from ', "box", from Greek ', "basket") is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. Cisterns are distinguished from wells by ...

s, and a number of houses built of stone. The remains of a small castle fort are dated by him to the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...

, if not earlier. Not far from it lay a number of columns that once ornamented a church. Close to the village was a

khan Khan may refer to: *Khan (inn), from Persian, a caravanserai or resting-place for a travelling caravan *Khan (surname), including a list of people with the name *Khan (title), a royal title for a ruler in Mongol and Turkic languages and used by ...

said to have been built by Jezzar Pasha from which an aqueduct traveled through the valley under high arches. In 1881, the PEF's ''Survey of Western Palestine'' (SWP) described the place as "A stone and conglomerate village, having 200 Moslems, situated on the plain, with

olive The olive, botanical name ''Olea europaea'', meaning 'European olive' in Latin, is a species of small tree or shrub in the family Oleaceae, found traditionally in the Mediterranean Basin. When in shrub form, it is known as ''Olea europaea'' ' ...

pomegranate The pomegranate (''Punica granatum'') is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub in the family Lythraceae, subfamily Punicoideae, that grows between tall. The pomegranate was originally described throughout the Mediterranean Basin, Mediterranean re ...

mulberries ''Morus'', a genus of flowering plants in the family Moraceae, consists of diverse species of deciduous trees commonly known as mulberries, growing wild and under cultivation in many temperate world regions. Generally, the genus has 64 identif ...

, and arable land; the aqueduct supplies good water." A population list from about 1887 showed that ''el Mazra'h'' had about 185 inhabitants, all Muslim.

British Mandate

In the

1922 census of Palestine The 1922 census of Palestine was the first census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine, on 23 October 1922. The reported population was 757,182, including the military and persons of foreign nationality. The divis ...

conducted by the British Mandate authorities ''Mazra'a'' had a population of 218; all Muslims,Barron, 1923, Table XI, Sub-district of Acre, p
36
/ref> increasing in the 1931 census to a population of 320; 307 Muslims, 5 Christians and 8 Baháʼís, in a total of 78 houses.Mills, 1932, p
102
/ref> In the 1945 statistics the population of Mazra was 430; 410 Muslims, 10 Christians and 10 classified as “others”.Department of Statistics, 1945, p
4
/ref> The land area was counted together with those of Shavei Zion, Ein Sara and Ga'aton and totalled 7,407

dunam A dunam ( Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; tr, dönüm; he, דונם), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area equivalent to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amou ...

s of land according to an official land and population survey. A total of 737 dunams were for citrus and bananas, 1,631 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 4,033 used for cereals, while 113 dunams were built-up (urban) land.

Israel

Mazra'a is one of the few Palestinian

coastal towns in the

Western Galilee Galilee (; he, הַגָּלִיל, hagGālīl; ar, الجليل, al-jalīl) is a region located in northern Israel and southern Lebanon. Galilee traditionally refers to the mountainous part, divided into Upper Galilee (, ; , ) and Lower Galile ...

to have remained populated after the

1948 Arab–Israeli war The 1948 (or First) Arab–Israeli War was the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. It formally began following the end of the British Mandate for Palestine at midnight on 14 May 1948; the Israeli Declaration of Independence had ...

.Morris, 2004, p
253
/ref> It served as a collection point for villagers expelled from the neighbouring villages of al-Zeeb and al-Bassa, assaulted and depopulated during Operation Ben-Ami beginning on 13 May 1948, two days before the official outbreak of the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. This caused the population to increase from 460 in 1946 to 620 in 1951. The land area of 312 hectares owned by Mazra'a in 1945 was reduced to 30 hectares in 1962, for reasons that included an expropriation of 155 hectares by the Israeli government in 1953–54.

Notable structures

Vaulted medieval building

The medieval building is located on the east side of the aqueduct, in the old part of the village. The

masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units, which are often laid in and bound together by mortar; the term ''masonry'' can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are bricks, building ...

, composed of large (average size 1m x 0.5m) blocks, is consistent with a medieval date. Petersen, who visited the place in 1991 and 1994 and examined it, found two chambers, one long (11.4 x 6.35m) chamber aligned east-west, and one smaller chamber aligned north-south. Rock-cut troughs found in the smaller room indicated that it might have been a

stable A stable is a building in which livestock, especially horses, are kept. It most commonly means a building that is divided into separate stalls for individual animals and livestock. There are many different types of stables in use today; the ...

Khan al Waqif

The building is a square enclosure, located about 800 m. north of the village, and it is associated with the construction of the Kabri aqueduct at the beginning of the nineteenth century.Petersen, 2001, p
219
/ref> On the NE and the NW corners of the

courtyard A courtyard or court is a circumscribed area, often surrounded by a building or complex, that is open to the sky. Courtyards are common elements in both Western and Eastern building patterns and have been used by both ancient and contemporary ...

are staircases leading to the flat roof. The south part of the building consists of a vaulted hall, with an arcade of six

arch An arch is a vertical curved structure that spans an elevated space and may or may not support the weight above it, or in case of a horizontal arch like an arch dam, the hydrostatic pressure against it. Arches may be synonymous with vau ...

es facing the courtyard.

Khan Evron

This building is located about 1 km north-east of the village, just south of the Kabri aqueduct. The design is very similar to the Khan al Waqif, and it is assumed that they date from the same age.Petersen, 2001, pp
219
220.

References

Bibliography

* * * * p. 133-135, Cited in Petersen, 2001. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

External links

Mazra'a (Israel)
*Survey of Western Palestine, Map 3
IAAWikimedia commons
{{North District (Israel) Arab localities in Israel Local councils in Northern District (Israel)