Summary
A Christian merchant from Jaffa whose dealings with the Aqraba and Bayta peasant Abd al-Rahman al-Khalil are Chapter 4 of Rediscovering Palestine’s case study of how coastal merchants used Salam contracts to organize cash-crop production for European markets in the interior, and then to appropriate peasant land on default (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 3100-3159, lines 3220-3279).
Details
- In early May 1851 Mitri paid Abd al-Rahman al-Khalil of Aqraba 2,997 piasters as salam on 81 kayla of sesame to be transported to Jaffa; unusually, Mitri covered the transportation costs himself and promised Abd al-Rahman one-third of the profit once the sesame was sold — incentives Doumani reads as a non-Nabulsi merchant’s need to lure peasants past local commercial networks and guarantee enforcement (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 3100-3159).
- Mitri invested in sesame in 1851, the season before French imports of Palestinian sesame increased greatly beginning in 1852 (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 3100-3159).
- On August 1, 1852, by a private contract in the Nimr family papers, Mitri bought as fully private property what technically were state agricultural lands in Kafr Bayta from Abd al-Rahman and his brother Mustafa for 10,000 piasters, deducting 4,420 piasters the brothers owed him and 1,420 piasters Abd al-Rahman owed to Qasim son of Yusuf al-Nabulsi; three years later he sold the same land to Abd al-Fattah Agha Nimr, again without registering it in the Nablus Islamic Court (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 3220-3279).
Related pages
Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, Salam, Commoditization of land, Nimr family, Jabal Nablus