ON LAND TENURE IN ANCIENT TIMES. 161 
customary law that harvesting in the lands of a Village- 
Community must all go on at the same time, and that one 
man must not begin to reap before his neighbours. Barley 
or wheat may be sown on different strips in the same field, 
as the harvest in this case comes about the same time, barley 
harvest preceding wheat harvest by about a fortnight only. 
But a man may not sow simsim, our sesame, a kind of rape, 
which, after the olive, is the chief oil-producing plant of 
Palestine, amongst fields where his neighbours are sowing 
corn; for the simsim would ripen considerably later than the 
cereals, and this would lead to a breach of the law which 
requires that the harvesting of the strips in each field must 
all take place at the same time. 
A farmer often finds himself, under this system of allotting 
the land, with 20 or 30 small strips, all separated from one 
another, and sometimes miles apart. Yet, notwithstanding 
its grave inconvenience, the fellahheen cling with the utmost 
tenacity to this ancient usage, and the Turkish Government 
has vainly endeavoured to induce them to allow the land to 
be portioned out amongst them individually once for all, m 
order that each person may be registered as the permanent 
possessor of a certain portion of the soil. Failing to succeed 
in this, it has had to content itself with recording the names 
of all the inhabitants of each village as joint owners of the 
entire land attached to it. 
A part of the land is cultivated each year by the other 
villagers on behalf of those of their number who, owing to 
their office, are unable to till the ground for themselves. 
Such a portion of the soil, cultivated by the community for 
one of their number, is known as the Shckarah. There is 
commonly to be seen the Sheharat el Khateeb, or “portion of 
the religious teacher,” and the Shekarat en Nejjar, or “portion 
of the carpenter,” assigned to them each year in return for 
their respective services.* Our Saviour, doubtless, like 
Joseph His reputed father, had His Shékarat en Nejjar cul~ 
tivated for Him in the arable ground belonging to the Village- 
Community at Nazareth.t 
* These are the only two officials so supported, for the carpenter is the 
only artizan of an ordinary Palestine village, being blacksmith and mason 
as well, and the Ahatech is not only the religious teacher, chairman of 
meetings, scribe, recorder, and accountant of the place, but also combines 
with these the offices of medical man and barber. 
+ For many of the above facts I am indebted to the interesting and 
accurate observations of Mr. Samuel Bergheim, formerly of Jerusalem, 
who possessed peculiar advantages for studying the manners and customs 
