Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dzt6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T01:21:46.054Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Meret Shehena, ‘Brothers' Land’ S. F. Nadel's Land Tenure on the Eritrean Plateau Revisited

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2011

Kjetil Tronvoll
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article revisits S.F. Nadel's study on land tenure in highland Eritrea from the mid‐1940s, and presents the current framework of the communal land tenure system of meret shehena. Under the meret shehena system, all land under the domain of the village is perceived as the common property of the village inhabitants. To restrict outsiders access to land, habitation rights (tisha) to the villages is guided by agnatic descent, and individuals obtain usufruct rights to land through residence in the village. The article proves that since Nadel's study almost sixty years ago, descent rules defining habitation rights have been changed, in order to restrict distant descendants returning to the village and claiming their land rights. Nevertheless, the overall workings of the system that redistributes all shehena land every seventh year to the village inhabitants, shows a remarkable resemblance to the observations made by Nadel. It appears that the customary operational guidelines of the system are virtually unaffected by wars and political turbulence during the last fifty years, following the core principle that each male adult individual with habitation rights (tisha) who marries and establishes a separate household, will be entitled to an equal share (gibri) of the village land, in order to secure the livelihood of all household members.

Résumé

Cet article revient sur l'étude menée par S. F. Nadel dans les années 40 sur le régime foncier dans les régions montagneuses d'Erythrée et décrit brièvement le cadre actuel du régime foncier communal meret shehena. Au titre de ce régime, toutes les terres situées sur le domaine du village sont considérées comme des biens communs. Pour limiter l'accès des personnes extérieures, le droit d'y vivre (tisha) est déterminé par filiation agnatique et les personnes jouissent d'un droit d'usufruit en vertu de leur résidence. Cet article montre que depuis le temps de Nadel, les règles de filiation qui défmissent les droits d'habitation ont changé afin de dissuader les parents éloignés de revenir pour revendiquer leurs droits fonciers. Néanmoins, le fonctionnement global du système qui consiste à redistribuer toutes les terres shehena tous les sept ans est remarquablement similaire aux observations de Nadel. Les règles coutumières semblent ne pas avoir été affectées, ou peu, par les guerres et l'agitation politique des cinquante dernières années et continuent de suivre le principe fondamental selon lequel tout homme adulte jouissant de droits d'habitation (tisha) qui se marie et forme son propre foyer peut prétendre à une part égale (gibri) des terres du village afin d'assurer sa subsistance.

Type
Research Article
Information
Africa , Volume 70 , Issue 4 , November 2000 , pp. 595 - 613
Copyright
© Edinburgh University Press 2000

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bondestam, Lars. 1989. Eritrea: med rätt til självbestämmande. Lysekil, Sweden: Clavis förlag.Google Scholar
Bruce, John W. 1993. ‘Do indigenous tenure systems constrain agricultural development?’ in Bassett, T. J. and D. E., Crummy (eds), Land in African Agrarian Systems, pp. 35–56. Madison WI: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Department of Land Tenure. 1969. Report on Land Tenure Survey of Eritrea Province. Addis Ababa: Ministry of Land Reform and Administration.Google Scholar
Firebrace, J. withHolland, S. 1984. Never Kneel Down: drought, development and liberation in Eritrea. Nottingham: Spokesman.Google Scholar
Freeman, J. D. 1956. ‘Siegfried Frederick Nadel, 1903–56’, Oceania 27 (1), 1–11.Google Scholar
Gebre‐ Medhin, Jordan. 1989. Peasants and Nationalism in Eritrea: a critique of Ethiopian studies. Lawrenceville NJ: Red Sea Press.Google Scholar
Gebremedhin, Tesfa G. 1996. Beyond Survival: the economic challenges of agriculture and development in post‐independent Eritrea. Lawrenceville NJ: Red Sea Press.Google Scholar
Gilkes, Patrick. 1991. ‘Eritrea: historiography and mythology’, African Affairs 90 (362), 623–8.Google Scholar
Houtart, François. 1980. ‘The social revolution in Eritrea’, in Davidson, B.et al. (eds), Behind the War in Eritrea. Nottingham: Spokesman.Google Scholar
Joireman, Sandra Fullerton. 1996. ‘The minefield of land reform: comments on the Eritrean land proclamation’, African Affairs 95, 269–85.Google Scholar
Longrigg, Stephen H. 1945. A Short History of Eritrea. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Niecko, Joanna. 1980. ‘The Role of Land Tenure in the System of Ethiopian Imperial Government in Modern Times’. Ph.D. thesis, trans. K. A. Bobinski, Warsaw: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego.Google Scholar
Mesghenna, Yemane. 1988. ‘Italian Colonialism: a case study of Eritrea, 1869–1934: motive, practice and result’. Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Lund: Department of Economic History, University of Lund.Google Scholar
Nadel, S. F. 1944a. Races and Tribes of Eritrea. Asmara: British Military Administration.Google Scholar
Nadel, S. F. 1944b. Eritrea and her Neighbours. Asmara: British Military Administration.Google Scholar
Nadel, S. F. 1945. ‘Notes on Beni Amer society’, Sudan Notes and Records 26 (1), 1–44.Google Scholar
Nadel, S. F. 1946. ‘Land tenure on the Eritrean plateau’, Africa 16 (1), 1–22; 16 (2), 99–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Negash, Tekeste. 1986. No Medicine for the Bite of a White Snake: notes on nationalism and resistance in Eritrea, 1890–1940. Uppsala: University of Uppsala.Google Scholar
Negash, Tekeste. 1987. Italian Colonialism in Eritrea, 1882–1941: policies, praxis and impact. Studia Historica Upsaliensia 148. Uppsala: Department of History, University of Uppsala.Google Scholar
Negash, Tekeste and Tronvoll, Kjetil. 2000. Brothers at War: making sense of the Eritrea–Ethiopia war. Oxford: James Currey.Google Scholar
Pateman, Roy. 1990. Eritrea: even the stones are burning. Lawrenceville NJ: Red Sea Press.Google Scholar
Pausewang, Siegfried. 1983. Peasants, Land and Society: a social history of land reform in Ethiopia. Munich: Weltforum Verlag.Google Scholar
Rahmato, Dessalegn. 1984. Agrarian Reform in Ethiopia. Uppsala: Scandinavian Institute of African Studies.Google Scholar
Sherman, Richard. 1980. Eritrea: the unfinished revolution. New York: Praeger.Google Scholar
Trevaskis, G. K. N. 1960. Eritrea: a colony in transition, 1941–52. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Tronvoll, Kjetil. 1998a. ‘The process of nation‐building in post‐war Eritrea: created from below or directed from above?’ Journal of Modern African Studies 36 (3), 461–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tronvoll, Kjetil. 1998b. Mai Weini: a highland village in Eritrea. Lawrenceville NJ: Red Sea Press.Google Scholar
Tronvoll, Kjetil. 1999. ‘Borders of violence – boundaries of identity: demarcating the Eritrean nation‐state’, Ethnic and Racial Studies 22 (6), 1037–60.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Zekarias, Ambaye. 1966. Land Tenure in Eritrea (Ethiopia). Addis Ababa.Google Scholar