Egypt : handbook for travellers / edited by K. Baedeker.

Date:
1885-1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Egypt : handbook for travellers / edited by K. Baedeker. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    60/628 (page 36)
    Another kind of landed property is called Ab:ddtyeh, by which is meant the uncultivated land presented by the Khedive to suitable per- sons with full right of property on condition of its being reclaimed or cultivated. Estates of this kind pay no taxes for the first three years, after which 10 per cent on the value of the produce is levied Cushr). The rest of the land is officially known as El-Ar&di el-Miriyeh, i.e. government estates. Nearly the whole of the soil of Egypt is thus in the hands of government. The fellahin or peasants are merely tenants for life, or so long as they con- tinue to pay their ground-rent (khardg). According to the Koran, an estate on the death of the life-tenant reverts to the bet el-mal, or government treasury, as the common property of all Muslims; hut a humane law of 1857 provides that it may be claimed by the next of kin of both sexes on payment of 24 tariff piastres per feddan for registration of the title. The trees planted by the life-tenant, and the buildings and irrigating apparatus erected by him, are his property, and pass to his heirs. The right of occupation, or usufruct, of these lands may also be sold, let, or mortgaged; but the contract must be ratified by government in each case; and where mortgaged lands are not redeemed within fifteen years, they continue in possession of the mortgagee and become his property. A piece of land may at any time be taken possession of by government for public purposes (railways, canals, embankments), in which case the oc- cupant receives another piece of land elsewhere as compensation. The ground-tax (khardg) is in some cases as high as 20 per cent. Instead of a certain tax being imposed on each village as formerly, the tax payable by each estate is now fixed by the Mudiriyeh or chief authorities of the province. To facilitate the collection of taxes, all landed estates are formed into groups, generally consisting of properties taxed at the same rate, and known in Lower Egypt as hdd, and in Upper Egypt as kabaleh. In certain poor districts where there was a difficulty in collecting the taxes in the reign of Mohammed ‘Ali, payment was undertaken by a number of capitalists, who were empowered to recover them from the fellahin. This right, however, was not transferable, and it could be resumed by the government at any time. Groups of estates where this system still prevails are called hihdeh. Since 1822 several attempts have been made at a comprehensive scheme of land valuation, but none has been carried out for more than a few limited districts. In 1879, however, a land valuation office was established at Cairo in connection with the projected reforms in the land-tax. Population. The population of Egypt has been ascertained to have been greater in ancient than in modern times; for, disregard- ing the exaggerated calculation of Theocritus, based on a mere as- sumption, it appears to have numbered at least 74/2 million souls in the time of Josephus and the Emperor Nero. This number is quite reasonable in itself, as it is estimated that the country could sup- port 8-9 million inhabitants. According to the enumeration made by Amici Bey in 1882 the present population of Egypt proper is 6,811,448, or about 600 per square mile, and is therefore denser than that of most European states. The thickest population is found in the province of Esneh, the thinnest in the Fayum and in Behereh. The sexes occur in al- most equal proportions. The number of houses enumerated in the same census is 1,090,000, distributed among 12,876 towns, vil- lages, and hamlets. The population of the provinces beyond the limits of Egypt proper, on the other hand, has never been ascer- tained by any regular census, and can therefore only be estimated in a conjectural way. The densest population is that of the pro-