Page 63 - Arabian Studies (I)

The Cultivation of Cereals in Mediaeval Yemen 49

The top of an underground silo (mad fan) just
when the filling has been completed, the top of
the pile of millet grain showing at the centre of the
foot of the picture. The wooden measure (qadah)
has an iron band round the top and bottom. The
measure when filled with grain is smoothed over
level with the top with the hand, whereas in the
Dali* district it is heaped up on top conically, the
surplus spilling over. Mabyan, where this photo­
graph was taken on 10 November 1966, is a small
town in the Zaidf country, a little north of Hajjah,
but its mediaeval buildings were badly destroyed
by Egyptian bombing, though not the mad fans
which are at least mediaeval if not much older;
they are constructed on arches with roofs of fitted
masonry. The hat worn by the men is the woven
bamboo cap (khaizuran) of the Yemen.
{Photo R. B. Serjeant)

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