The Taxes Which All Classes Of Fellahs In The Haouran Pay, May Be
Classed Under Four Heads:
The Miri; the expense of feeding soldiers on
the march; the tribute to the Arabs; and extraordinary contributions.
The Miri is levied upon the Fedhan; thus if a village pay twelve purses
to the Miri, and there are thirty pair of
[P.300] oxen in it, the master of each pair pays a thirtieth. Every
village being rated for the Miri in the land-tax book of the Pasha, at a
fixed sum, that sum is levied as long as the village is at all
inhabited, however few may be its inhabitants. In the spring of every
year, or, if no strangers have arrived and settled, in every second or
third spring, the ground of the village is measured by long cords, when
every Fellah occupies as much of it as he pleases, there being always
more than sufficient; the amount of his tax is then fixed by the Sheikh,
at the ratio which his number of Fedhans bears to the whole number of
Fedhans cultivated that year. Whether the oxen be strong or weak, or
whether the quantity of seed sown or of land cultivated by the owner of
the oxen be more or less, is not taken into consideration; the Fellah is
supposed to keep strong cattle, and plough as much land as possible.
Some sow six Gharara of wheat or barley in the Fedhan, others five, and
others seven. The boundaries of the respective fields are marked by
large stones [Arabic]. The Miri is paid in kind, or in money, at the
will of the Pasha; the Fellahs prefer the latter, by which they are
always trifling gainers.
From what has been said, it is evidently impossible for the Fellah to
foresee the amount of Miri which he shall have to pay in any year; and
in addition to this vexation, the Miri for each village, though it is
never diminished upon a loss of inhabitants, is sometimes raised upon a
supposed increase of population, or upon some other pretext. It may,
generally, be remarked, that the villages inhabited by the Druses
usually pay more Miri than those in the plain, because some allowance is
made to the latter, in consideration of the tribute which they are
obliged to pay to the Arabs, and from which the former are exempt. At
Aaere, the year before my first visit, the Fedhan had paid one hundred
and fifty piastres, at Ezra, one hundred and eighty, and at some
villages in the plain,
[p.301]one hundred and twenty. In the year 1812, the Miri, including
some extra demands, amounted in general to five hundred piastres the
Fedhan.
The second tax upon the Fellahs is the expense of feeding soldiers on
the march; if the number is small they go to the Sheikh's Medhafe; but
if they are numerous, they are quartered, or rather quarter themselves,
upon the Fellahs: in the former case, barley only for their horses is
supplied by the peasant, while the Sheikh furnishes provisions for the
men, but the peasant is not much benefited by this regulation, for the
soldiers are in general little disposed to be satisfied with the frugal
fare of the Sheikh, and demand fowls, or butcher's meat; which must be
supplied by the village. On their departure, they often steal some
article belonging to the house. The proportion of barley to be furnished
by each individual to the soldiers horses, depends of course upon the
number of horses to be fed, and of Fedhans in the village: at Aaere, in
the year 1809, it amounted to fifty piastres per Fedhan. The Sheikh of
Aaere has six pair of oxen, for which he pays no taxes, but the presence
of strangers and troops is so frequent at his Medhafe, that this
exemption had not been thought a sufficient remuneration, and he is
entitled to levy, in addition, every year, two or three Gharara of corn,
each Gharara being in common years, worth eighty or one hundred
piastres. Some Sheikhs levy as much as ten Gharara, besides being
exempted from taxation for eight, ten, or twelve pair of oxen.
The third and most heavy contribution paid by the peasants, is the
tribute to the Arabs. The Fahely, Serdie, Beni Szakher, Serhhan, who are
constant residents in the Haouran, as well as most of the numerous
tribes of Aeneze, who visit the country only in the summer, are, from
remote times, entitled to certain tributes called Khone (brotherbood),
from every village in the Haouran. In return
[p.302]for this Khone, the Arabs abstain from touching the harvest of
the village, and from driving off its cattle and camels, when they meet
them in their way. Each village pays Khone to one Sheikh in every tribe;
the village is then known as his Ukhta [Arabic] or Sister, as the Arabs
term it, and he protects the inhabitants against all the members of his
own tribe. It may easily be imagined, however, that depredations are
often committed, without the possibility of redress, the depredator
being unknown, or flying immediately towards the desert. The amount of
the Khone is continually increasing; for the Arab Sheikh is not always
contented with the quantity of corn he received in the preceding year,
but asks something additional, as a present, which soon becomes a part
of his accustomed dues.
If the Pasha of Damascus were guided by sound policy, and a right view
of his own interests, he might soon put an end to the exactions of the
Arabs, by keeping a few thousand men, well paid, in garrison in the
principal places of the Haouran; but instead of this, his object is to
make the Khone an immediate source of income to himself; the chief
Sheikhs of the Fehely and Serdie receive yearly from the Pasha a present
of a pelisse, which entitles them to the tribute of the villages, out of
which the Fehely pays about twenty purses, and the Serdie twelve purses
into the Pasha's treasury.
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