History
Just southeast of the village (at grid 172/199) is a site where sherds mainly from the Achaemenid Empire, Persian era have been found. Pottery sherds from the early and late Roman Empire, Roman, Byzantine Empire, Byzantine, early Muslim and Medieval eras have been found at the village site.Ottoman era
Mirka, like all of Palestine (region), Palestine, was incorporated into the Ottoman Empire in 1517. In the 1596 daftar, tax registers, it was part of the ''nahiya'' ("subdistrict") of Jabal ''Sami'', part of the larger Sanjak of Nablus. It had a population of 9 households, all Muslims. The inhabitants paid a fixed tax rate of 33,3% on agricultural products, including wheat, barley, summer crops, olive trees, goats and beehives, a press for olive oil or grape syrup, in addition to occasional revenues and a fixed tax for people of Nablus area; a total of 3,780 akçe. In the 1882 Palestine Exploration Fund, PEF's ''PEF Survey of Palestine, Survey of Western Palestine'' (SWP), ''Merkeh'' is described as: "a Hamlet (place), hamlet on the side of a bare hill."British Mandate era
In the 1922 census of Palestine conducted by the Mandatory Palestine, British Mandate authorities, ''Merka'' had a population 142 Muslims, increasing in the 1931 census of Palestine, 1931 census to 167 Muslim, in a total of 32 houses.Mills, 1932, pJordanian era
In the wake of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and after the 1949 Armistice Agreements, Mirka came under Jordanian rule. In 1961, the population was 303.Government of Jordan, Department of Statistics, 1964, pPost-1967
Since the Six-Day War in 1967, Mirka has been under Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Israeli occupation, and according to the Israeli census of that year, the population of ''Mirka'' stood at 142, of whom 59 were registered as having come from Israel.References
Bibliography
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