Majdel Selm

Majdel Selm
مجدل سلم
Village
Map showing the location of  Majdel Selm within Lebanon
Majdel Selm

Location within Lebanon

Coordinates: 33°13′18″N 35°27′52″E / 33.22167°N 35.46444°E / 33.22167; 35.46444Coordinates: 33°13′18″N 35°27′52″E / 33.22167°N 35.46444°E / 33.22167; 35.46444
Grid position 193/291 PAL
Country  Lebanon
Governorate Nabatieh Governorate
District Marjeyoun District
Elevation 560 m (1,840 ft)
Time zone EET (UTC+2)
  Summer (DST) EEST (UTC+3)
Dialing code +961

Majdel Selm, or Mejdel Islim, (Arabic: مجدل سلم) is a village the Marjeyoun District in Southern Lebanon.

Name

According to E. H. Palmer, the name Mejdel Islim means Islim’s watch-tower, p.n.[1]

History

In 1596, it was named as a village, Majdal Salim, in the Ottoman nahiya (subdistrict) of Tibnin under the liwa' (district) of Safad, with a population of 51 households and 8 bachelors, all Muslim. The villagers paid a fixed tax-rate of 25 % on agricultural products, such as wheat, barley, olive trees, fruit trees, vegetable and fruit garden, orchard, goats, beehives, in addition to "occasional revenues" and a press for olive oil or grape syrup; a total of 9,110 akçe.[2][3]

In 1875 Victor Guérin found that the village had about 300 Metawileh inhabitants.[4] He further noted: "A mosque, now abandoned and falling into ruins, has succeeded here a Byzantine church, the materials of which have been used in building it. Over one of the windows is a stone (apparently once the lintel) with an old Greek inscription, the characters of which are too much defaced to be read. A monolithic column lies beside it, half buried in the ground, surmounted by a capital sculptured in form of open basket work."[5]

In 1881, the Palestine Exploration Fund's Survey of Western Palestine (SWP) described it as a "large village, built of stone, of ancient appearance, containing about 500 [..] Metawileh [..]. Situated on table land, surrounded by olives and arable land. Water supply from a large masonry birket and many cisterns."[6] They further noted: "Village containing several good lintels and remains of ruins; an ancient road leads from the village to the Birkeh."[7]

References

  1. Palmer, 1881, p. 29
  2. Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 181
  3. Note that Rhode, 1979, p. 6 writes that the register that Hütteroth and Abdulfattah studied was not from 1595/6, but from 1548/9
  4. Guérin, 1880, p. 267
  5. Guérin, 1880, pp. 267-268; as given in Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, pp. 136
  6. Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p. 89
  7. Conder and Kitchener, 1881, SWP I, p. 136

Bibliography

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