The People of Palestine: An enlarged edition of "The Peasantry of Palestine, Life, Manners and Customs of the Village"Grant, Elihu
General
The People of Palestine: An enlarged edition of "The Peasantry of Palestine, Life, Manners and Customs of the Village"
Grant, Elihu
Palestine -- Social life and customs; Palestinian Arabs -- Social life and customs; Peasants -- Palestine
Owners of camels, mules or donkeys buy up supplies of oil, dried figs
and wheat from the villages and sell them in the village markets, or
carry them to Jerusalem and Jaffa. From Jaffa they may bring up rice,
sugar, kerosene, oranges and wood to supply the Râm Allâh merchants.
Such articles in bulk are very apt to come from the seashore direct, but
others are brought out from Jerusalem.
[Illustration: CAMEL CARRYING A ROPE NET FILLED WITH CLAY JARS]
[Illustration: RÂM ALLÂH, AS ENTERED BY THE SINUOUS, WALLED LANE, FROM
THE EAST]
There are something over two scores of shops in Râm Allâh, counting
eight shoemakers’, a dozen weavers’ and several butchers’ stands. There
are a good many quarriers, stone-masons and stone-dressers, plasterers
and roof-menders. Most of the people have work of some kind on the small
farming plots, vineyards and orchards. There are a few presses for
making the oil and several cisterns for storing it. A few public
carriages have been introduced since the opening of the way to Jerusalem
for vehicles.
A butcher’s fixtures consist of some iron hooks in the wall at the
street side. Sheep have for years been killed right in the streets, the
carcasses being hung up against abutting buildings, dressed quickly and
divided to waiting customers. Perhaps a little girl is waiting to carry
home some scraps in her sleeve. A member of a larger or richer household
buys a larger piece, which is held in a scrap of brown paper or, more
likely, a vessel brought from home. Sometimes, however, the purchase is
carried off as it is. The matter of price is a simple one; it is the
same for any part of the creature. Haggling may vary it a trifle, unless
the demand for meat on a given day is unusual. Ordinarily the killing of
a sheep is deferred until a market for the meat is fairly well assured.
The price in Râm Allâh ranges from eight to twelve cents a pound,
according to the season of the year and the scarcity of sheep. Goat meat
is cheaper. Sometimes beef is offered, but one usually suspects the
health of a cow that has been killed and prefers lamb. In Jerusalem fair
beef can be obtained, but seldom can it be had in the country.
From a point a little beyond the end of the market proper a street turns
to the left (south), passes the back entrance to the Greek Church
property and goes off towards the largest village threshing-floor. On
this road there are twenty-two houses, one store and one silversmith’s
shop. Seven hundred eighty feet along this way is the threshing-floor.
Not quite half-way to the threshing-floor is an open space used as a
sort of secondary market for such things as would take up too much room
in the main street. From the beginning of the threshing-floor one
hundred thirty feet onward brings one opposite an interesting place. It
is a little sanctuary in a cave and is about a short stone’s throw to
the right (west), under a large tree which can be seen from the road.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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