Artas, Bethlehem

Infobox Palestinian Authority muni
name=Artas


imgsize=250px
caption=The Convent of the Hortus Conclusus, Artas
arname=أرطاس
meaning=
founded=
type=mund
typefrom=
altOffSp=
altUnoSp=
governorate=bl
latd=31|latm=41|lats=20.89|latNS=N
longd=35 |longm=11|longs=10.38|longEW=E
population=3,700
popyear=2006
area=4,304
areakm=4.3
mayor=Hamdi Aish [ [http://www.nablus.org/en/htm/guide/Municipalities.htm Nablus Guide: Municipalities] Nablus Municipality]

Artas ( _ar. أرطاس) is a Palestinian village located four kilometers southwest of Bethlehem in the Bethlehem Governorate in the central West Bank. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics, the town had a population of 3,663 in mid-year 2006. [ [http://www.pcbs.gov.ps/Portals/_pcbs/populati/pop10.aspx Projected Mid -Year Population for Bethlehem Governorate by Locality 2004- 2006] Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics]

Geography

Artas and the surrounding area is characterized by the diversity of landscapes, flora and fauna due to its location at a meeting place of ecosystems. [ [http://www.bethlehem.ps/cultural_sites/natural_heritage/artas_valley.php Artas Valley] ] Archeological sites and historic remains dating from the Iron Age to Ottoman times are located in the village. Just across the valley from the village itself is the Convent of the Hortus Conclusus. [http://www.bethlehem.ps/religious_sites/sites/hortus.php Hortus Conclusus (the Sealed Gardens)] Until the 19th century, the Artas' residents were responsible for guarding the Solomon's Pools, a unique water system conducting water to Bethlehem and Herodium and the Temple Mount or Haram al-Sharif in Jerusalem. The village has a tradition of hosting foreign and local scholars and other visitors dating to the mid-19th century, not a few of whom were women. [http://www.palestine-family.net/index.php?nav=5-206&cid=494&did=4794&pageflip=1 A Century and a Half of Women's Encounters in Artas] As a result, there is a great body of work on all aspects of the village, [http://www.palestine-family.net/index.php?nav=223-222&cid=534&did=1040&pageflip=1 Recommended Reading and Selected Bibliography of Artas ] The Artas Folklore Center was established in 1993 by Musa Sanad (1949-2005) [http://www.thisweekinpalestine.com/details.php?id=1263&ed=100&edid=100] to document, preserve and share the rich heritage of the village. Among other things, it operates a small folklore museum, has a dabka and drama troupe, and a rural women's unit. It is best known for the Annual Artas Lettuce Festival which it has hosted every year since 1994. These and other factors make Artas a popular destination for visitors to Bethlehem who want to experience traditional Palestinian life, and for groups catering to ecotourism, cultural tourism or authentic tourism. [ [http://www.bethlehem.ps Welcome To Bethlehem.ps ] ] Since the expropriation and destruction of orchards of Artas villagers in 2007, for use by a neighboring Israeli settlement, and the construction of the Israeli West Bank barrier, the village has recently also shown up in the news in connection with the conflict. [ [http://www.vtjp.org/background/Separation_Wall_News0507.php Separation Wall News - Vermonters for a Just Peace in Palestine / Israel] ]

European investment and Artas in the 19th century

The earliest foreign residents in Artas came through the auspices of Christian missionaries in the mid nineteenth century, one of whom was James Finn, the British Consul of Jerusalem for seventeen years (1846 to 1863), [http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0006-0895(198509)48%3A3%3C181%3AEAF%3E2.0.CO%3B2-W] and his wife Elisabeth Ann Finn bought land in Artas, among other places, with the purpose of creating an experimental farm to employ poverty stricken Jews from the Old city of Jerusalem. Eventually the farm was joined by Johann Grossteinbeck and his brother Friedrich and John Meshullam (1799-1878), a converted Jew and member of a British missionary society. Clorinda S. Minor was also a resident at the village in 1851 and 1853.

In the end the Arabs opened “Solomon’s Pools” and 90,000 cubit meters of water swept through the school and Meshullam took the hint that he wasn’t welcome. They then moved mikveh Yisrael to the Tel-Aviv area.

In the 1870s the Palestine Exploration Fund and Claude Conder visited the village and remarked that it was "a small village perched against hill-side...with a good spring behind it whence an acqueduct led to Jebel Furedis...remains of a reservoir Humman Suleiman." [C. Conder and H. Kitchener, The Survey of Western Palestine, Memoirs, Vol III, Judae, p. 27 'Urtas'.]

Foreign missionaries as well as local and foreign scholars continued to come to Artas. One of the best known of the latter was the Swedish-Finnish anthropologist Hilma Granqvist who arrived at Artas in the 1920s as part of her research on the women of the Old Testament. She "arrived in Palestine in order to find the Jewish ancestors of Scripture. What she found instead was a Palestinian people with a distinct culture and way of life. She therefore changed the focus of her research to a full investigation of the customs, habits and ways of thinking of the people of that village. Granqvist ended up staying till 1931 documenting all aspects of village life. In so doing she took hundreds of photographs." [ [http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2001/535/cu1.htm Other Palestines] 24 - 30 May 2001 Al-Ahram Weekly Online] Her many books about Artas were published between 1931 and 1965, making Artas one of the best documented Palestinian villages.

References

External links

* [http://www.artasfolklorecenter.net Artas Folklore Center]
* [http://www.palestineremembered.com/GeoPoints/Artas_809/SatelliteView.html Satellite View of Artas]
* [http://www.palestine-family.net Palestine Family.net]
* [http://www.bethlehem.ps Bethlehem.ps]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIPuhvDh3uY&feature=related Dabke Artas Lettuce Festival 2007 Part One]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1fCMMqjdXw Dabke Artas Lettuce Festival 2007 Part Two]