From the pages of the Defter: A social history of rural property tenure and the implementation of Tanzimat land reform in Hebron, Palestine (1858-1900) (original) (raw)

This dissertation is a socio-historical statistical study of the implementation and adoption of Tanzimat-era land-tenure reforms in the Palestinian countryside. It addresses three main questions: (1) what was the character of rural property tenure in mountainous regions of Palestine; (2) to what degree were modernizing property-reform measures adopted by the rural populace; and (3) how did the reform affect rural property-tenure and economic wellbeing? The 1858 Land Code was one of a series of Tanzimat reforms that together formalized individual title to property and land tenure. Yet, due to the dearth of accessible documentation, little is known about the implementation of these reforms. Among historians of Palestine, in the absence of proof to the contrary there is broad consensus that the reforms failed. It is widely argued that villagers evaded land registration en masse, either because they did not understand the significance of the reform or feared that increased taxation or conscription would result from property registration. This study brings to light and analyzes a property-value and property-tax assessment register (Esas-ı Emlak) compiled in 1876 (1292 maliyye) for the villages and rural agricultural lands of the large Halilürrahman (Hebron) district, south of Jerusalem. It permits, for the ix first time, systematic investigation of the implementation of property-tenure reforms in Palestine at a district-wide level. This study demonstrates that many rural agriculturalists in rural Hebron had independent economic power and landed wealth above subsistence levels. Hebronites were invested in implementing modernizing reforms to protect their landed assets, which they registered with the emlak, property-tax commission as individual holdings and as communally owned properties. While it is commonly understood that traditional, communal land-tenure arrangements (musha') were disallowed after land reform, this study demonstrates how it was incorporated into reform and protected the rights of shareholders. It also argues that property-tenure reform needs to be understood as a process, not an event. Villagers have rarely figured as subjects of Ottoman histories. This study exploits the emlak register together with sharia court cases and 1905 Ottoman population registries to flesh out a picture of late-Ottoman villages, villagers, and rural society from below in southern Palestine.