Bayyarat al-Khuri: An Ecclesiastical Agricultural Estate in Caesarea, Israel

This paper presents the first study devoted to a Late Ottoman/ British Mandate ecclesiastical estate in the Levant, focusing on Bayyarat al-Khuri in Caesarea on the coast of Palestine (1903– 1948). The study follows the remarkable tale of the Greek Patriarchate of Jerusalem’s endeavour to establish a Christian agricultural foothold in Caesarea’s holy landscape. The Church’s Caesarea properties consisted of residential and sacred precincts, including St. Paul’s supposed Prison Cellar, and the remnants of Caesarea’s Crusader cathedral. The agricultural estate was established southeast of the Bosnian town, within the confines of Caesarea’s Roman hippodrome, and was associated with the Jerusalem Patriarchate’s Brotherhood of the Holy Sepulchre. The paper places the foundation of the estate in the context of Late Ottoman transnational migration to, and rural settlement expansion in, the coastal plain of Palestine and the Velayet of Beirut, as well as within the dialectic between agricultural technological breakthroughs and customary agrarian practices. The use of a diesel engine, metal piping and Aegean/Greek style iron pegs illustrates the increased mobility of raw materials, capital, and engineering knowhow, characteristic of the late 19th century/early 20th century Mediterranean Basin, to what was once a remote and hard-to-access site