Jindas (
Arabic
Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...
: جنداس;
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...
: ג'ינדאס) is an
archaeological site
An archaeological site is a place (or group of physical sites) in which evidence of past activity is preserved (either prehistoric or recorded history, historic or contemporary), and which has been, or may be, investigated using the discipline ...
in modern-day Israel, 2 kilometers east of the city of
Lod
Lod (, ), also known as Lydda () and Lidd (, or ), is a city southeast of Tel Aviv and northwest of Jerusalem in the Central District of Israel. It is situated between the lower Shephelah on the east and the coastal plain on the west. The ci ...
in Israel's
Central District.
History
The site has been inhabited since at least the
Roman period
The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...
. Its name derives from the
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...
personal name
A personal name, full name or prosoponym (from Ancient Greek ''prósōpon'' – person, and ''onoma'' –name) is the set of names by which an individual person or animal is known. When taken together as a word-group, they all relate to that on ...
Γεννάδις < Γεννάδιος (Gennadios).
During the
Crusader-period, it was known as "Casal of Gendas", mentioned in a
Latin
Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
charter
A charter is the grant of authority or rights, stating that the granter formally recognizes the prerogative of the recipient to exercise the rights specified. It is implicit that the granter retains superiority (or sovereignty), and that the ...
dated 1129 CE.
Jisr Jindas, named after the village, is the most famous of the several bridges erected by Sultan
Baybars
Al-Malik al-Zahir Rukn al-Din Baybars al-Bunduqdari (; 1223/1228 – 1 July 1277), commonly known as Baibars or Baybars () and nicknamed Abu al-Futuh (, ), was the fourth Mamluk sultan of Egypt and Syria, of Turkic Kipchak origin, in the Ba ...
in Palestine, which include the
Yibna
Yibna (; ''Jabneh'' or ''Jabneel'' in Biblical times; ''Jamnia'' in Roman empire, Roman times; ''Lordship of Ibelin, Ibelin'' to the Crusades, Crusaders), or Tel Yavne, is an archaeological site and List of villages depopulated during the Arab– ...
and the
Isdud Bridges.
[Petersen, 2008, p]
297
/ref>
Jindās is mentioned in the 15th and 16th centuries as a flourishing village whose lands belonged to different religious endowments.
In 1552 Haseki Hürrem Sultan, the favorite wife of Suleiman the Magnificent
Suleiman I (; , ; 6 November 14946 September 1566), commonly known as Suleiman the Magnificent in the Western world and as Suleiman the Lawgiver () in his own realm, was the List of sultans of the Ottoman Empire, Ottoman sultan between 1520 a ...
, endowed a quarter of the tax revenues of Jindas to its Haseki Sultan Imaret
Haseki Sultan Imaret was an Ottoman public soup kitchen established in Jerusalem to feed the poor during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent. The imaret was part of a massive Waqf complex built in 1552 by Haseki Hürrem Sultan, better known i ...
in Jerusalem
Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...
. Administratively, the village belonged to District of Gaza.
In 1596 Jindas was home to 35 Muslim
Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...
households. The villagers paid a fixed tax rate of 33.3% for the crops that they cultivated, which included wheat, barley, as well as on other types of property, such as goats and beehives, a total of 5,372 akce, all paid to different waqf
A (; , plural ), also called a (, plural or ), or ''mortmain'' property, is an Alienation (property law), inalienable charitable financial endowment, endowment under Sharia, Islamic law. It typically involves donating a building, plot ...
s. Among these waqfs, revenues were distributed according to the following partition:
• Waqf Banī ‘Alī Abūghā 4/24
• Waqf Muḥammad Aḥmad al-Miṣrī 5/24
• Waqf al-‘Imāra al-‘Āmira 7/24
• Waqf Khalīl al-Raḥmān 8/24.
In 1051 AH/1641/2, the Bedouin tribe of al-Sawālima from around Jaffa
Jaffa (, ; , ), also called Japho, Joppa or Joppe in English, is an ancient Levantine Sea, Levantine port city which is part of Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel, located in its southern part. The city sits atop a naturally elevated outcrop on ...
attacked the villages of Subṭāra, Bayt Dajan, al-Sāfiriya, Jindās, Lydda
Lod (, ), also known as Lydda () and Lidd (, or ), is a city southeast of Tel Aviv and northwest of Jerusalem in the Central District of Israel. It is situated between the lower Shephelah on the east and the coastal plain on the west. The ci ...
and Yāzūr belonging to Waqf Haseki Sultan.
The desertion of Jindas in the 17th or early 18th century, as well as of its neighbors villages like Kafr Jinnis, reflects the unsettled conditions around Lydda as a result from the migrations of nomadic groups and local manifestations of the Qays and Yaman rivalry.
Jindas was resettled in the 19th century, but was abandoned before the end of the century. The inhabitants of Jindās were scattered throughout Palestine
Palestine, officially the State of Palestine, is a country in West Asia. Recognized by International recognition of Palestine, 147 of the UN's 193 member states, it encompasses the Israeli-occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and th ...
's central hill country. The lands of Jindas were cultivated by the inhabitants of Beit Nabala and Lydda
Lod (, ), also known as Lydda () and Lidd (, or ), is a city southeast of Tel Aviv and northwest of Jerusalem in the Central District of Israel. It is situated between the lower Shephelah on the east and the coastal plain on the west. The ci ...
. According to Roy Marom
Roy Marom (, ) is an Israeli historian and historical geographer. Marom is the curator of the Palestinian Rural History Project, which specializes in the history of the Palestinian countryside during the Ottoman and British Mandate periods.
...
, when Jewish settlement organizations expressed an interest in the region in 1878, the Ottomans declared the land waqf, putting an end to efforts to purchase land there for the establishment of Jewish farm colonies.
Excavations revealed traces of Late Ottoman infant
In common terminology, a baby is the very young offspring of adult human beings, while infant (from the Latin word ''infans'', meaning 'baby' or 'child') is a formal or specialised synonym. The terms may also be used to refer to juveniles of ...
jar-burials, commonly associated with nomads
Nomads are communities without fixed habitation who regularly move to and from areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, Nomadic pastoralism, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and Merchant, trader nomads. In the twentieth century, ...
or itinerant workers of Egyptian
''Egyptian'' describes something of, from, or related to Egypt.
Egyptian or Egyptians may refer to:
Nations and ethnic groups
* Egyptians, a national group in North Africa
** Egyptian culture, a complex and stable culture with thousands of year ...
origins.[Taxel, Y., Marom, R., & Nagar, Y. (2025)]
An Infant Jar Burial from Zarnūqa: Muslim Funerary Practices and Migrant Communities in Late Ottoman Palestine
'''Atiqot'', 117, 269–293.
In 2012, an urban renewal
Urban renewal (sometimes called urban regeneration in the United Kingdom and urban redevelopment in the United States) is a program of land redevelopment often used to address real or perceived urban decay. Urban renewal involves the clearing ...
organization established in Lod took the name "Jindas."
/ref>
References
Roman sites in Israel
Geography of Central District (Israel)
Crusader castles