Birzeit

Birzeit (Arabic: بيرزيت‎), also Bir Zeit, is a Palestinian town north of Ramallah in the central West Bank. Its population in the 2007 census was 4,529. Birzeit is the home to the Birzeit University.

History

Birzeit history dates back to the Byzantine era and earlier. West of the town, at Khirbat Bir Zait, are the remains of a building which have been dated to the Crusader era. Guérin first noted the remains of a buildings 50 paces on each side. He thought it could be from the Byzantine era, or later.

Ottoman era

The village was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517 with all of Palestine, and in 1596 it appeared in the tax registers under the name of Bir Zayt, as being in the nahiya of Jabal Quds in the liwa of Quds, with a population of 26 households. The inhabitants of the village paid taxes on wheat, barley, olive trees, vineyards, fruit trees, and goats and/or beehives.

The French explorer Victor Guérin visited the village in July 1863. He found it to have a population of 1,800 inhabitants, of those 140 were Latin Catholics, the others were "schismatic Greeks" and Muslims. The Catholic parish was administered by a young French missionary, Father Joly. The irrigated gardens were well grown, and the soil naturally fertile. It abounded in vines, figs and pears. He also noted some beautiful walnut trees.