Page 67 - Arabian Studies (I)

The Cultivation of Cereals in Mediaeval Yemen 53

their cars arc stripped by being rubbed together, the grains of it (the
millet) fall down and are tossed up and down on a basket-tray (to
remove them) from their husks, and one partakes of it.
When one wants to harvest it it should be harvested only when its
ear is dry, i.c. when dry of rain or dew — should rain or dew reach
it — then it is put in a place where neither rain or moisture can get at
it. It is beaten out with flails, i.e. curved sticks, removed from its
husks and lifted. Should there be a large quantity of it, it is
threshed/trodden with oxen and the stone. It is lifted in recep­
tacles1 7 1 but not buried (in storage-silos) for this burying would
cause it to perish and rot.
Of this (category) also is the millet, the ear, from WadrBuqlan in
the district of the Banu Shihab, i.e. the country of al-Qumll172 b.
Sa‘Id. So too they call seed-grain sib 1 7 3 in the dialect of the
Haidan174 people of the district of Kljawlan in Sa‘dah, and so too,
in other districts, in places like the Hazzah (area at the juncture of
the mountains with the Tihamah plain) of al-Qahmah and the places
nearby they also call it so’.

5. The fifth variety is rice.

In al-Isharah he said: ‘The time for sowing it is the ten chosen
[nights] of NIsan/Naisan [8 May—17 May (?)]175 and it is harvested
in Ab [ 14 August—]. If [it is grown] continuously on ground it ruins
it, so when it is sown on any ground it is essential that it not be
repeated there unless a year has passed. The places in the Yemen
where it is sown are the mountains of Haraz, Bura‘, and al-Lihb,176
it being sown at the same season [matnam] 1 70 as millet in this
afore-said country. I have sown it in al-Jahmallyah and it sprouted
and was harvested. The way in which it is cultivated is that the
ground is ploughed for it, the ground being thoroughly cleansed (of
weeds) by repeated ploughing, levelled with the scraper 0maharr),
and large bunds made also, to retain the water.’
In Milh al-f?ialahahl 77 he said: ‘All bush or grass that springs up
therein is cleaned away, and after ploughing it water is released onto
it till it remains lying over it retained in accordance with the [height
of] the bund. The more plentiful the water is the better. The water
remains stagnant/retained in the parcel178 of land until it clears,
settling for an entire night. Each parcel of land is bunded off
[tu'qam] by itself so that the water will not leave one parcel for
another. When the water has cleared the rice is sown by scatter­
sowing just like sesame, the rice [however] being in its husk. After
being scatter-sown it stays seven or eight days then the rice-shoot179

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