Summary
Historian cited by Doumani for Levant cotton trade figures and for objections to the view of unmitigated decline of local manufactures under European competition (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 1900-2166, lines 2390-2529).
Details
- Table 2, French Imports of Levant Cotton during the Eighteenth Century, is reproduced from Owen, Middle East, p. 7, and Table 7, British Exports to Syria/Palestine, 1836-1850, is adapted from Tables 6 and 7 in Owen, Middle East, p. 85 (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 1900-2166, lines 2390-2529).
- Owen noted that between 1831 and 1850 Ottoman imports of British twists and yarns rose from 1,700,000 pounds to nearly 6,350,000 pounds, a figure substantially higher than the one noted by Halil Inalcik in Table 6, with no question as to the trend (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 2390-2529).
- With Donald Quataert, Owen raised general objections to the traditional view of unmitigated decline: the Fertile Crescent’s internal market was growing in the nineteenth century due to rising population, European manufacturers failed to successfully imitate many local styles, patterns and fabrics, and imported British yarn was used by weavers to produce a cheap, durable cloth highly competitive with British cloth in cost (Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, lines 2390-2529).
Related pages
Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900, Deindustrialization, Alexander Schölch