Dunam

A dunam (Ottoman Turkish: دونم‎; Turkish: dönüm), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area equivalent to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amount of land that could be ploughed by a team of oxen in a day. The legal definition was "forty standard paces in length and breadth",[1] but its actual area varied considerably from place to place, from a little more than 900 m2 in Ottoman Palestine to around 2500 m2 in Iraq.[2][3]

The unit is still in use in many areas previously ruled by the Ottomans, although the new or metric dunam has been redefined as exactly one decare (1000 m2), which is 1/10 hectare (1/10 × 10000 m2, like the modern Greek royal stremma.[3]

History

The name dönüm, from the Ottoman Turkish dönmek (دونمك, "to turn") appears to be a calque of the Byzantine Greek stremma and had the same size. It was likely adopted by the Ottomans from the Byzantines in Mysia-Bithynia.[4]

The Dictionary of Modern Greek defines the old Ottoman stremma as approximately 1270 m2,[5] but Costas Lapavitsas used the value of 1600 m2 for the region of Naoussa in the early 20th century.[6]

Definition

Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro

In Bosnia and Herzegovina and also Serbia, the unit is called dulum (дулум) or dunum (дунум). In Bosnia and Herzegovina dunum (or dulum) equals 1000 m2. One dulum is equal to 1600 m2 for the region of Leskovac, south Serbia. In Albania it is called dynym or dylym. It is equal to 1,000 square meters.[7]

Bulgaria

In Bulgaria, the decare (декар) is used.

Cyprus

In Cyprus, a donum is 14,400 square feet (1,340 m2).[8] In the Republic of Cyprus older Greek-Cypriots also still refer to the donum, although this is gradually being replaced by another local Greek Cypriot dialect word, σκάλες ['skales], rather than the mainland Greek word stremma (equivalent to a decare). However, officially Cyprus uses the square metre and the hectare.

A donum consists of 4 evleks, each of which consists of 3,600 square feet (330 m2).

Greece
Main article: stremma

In Greece, the old dönüm is called a "Turkish stremma", while today, a stremma or "royal stremma" is exactly one decare, like the metric dönüm.[3]

Iraq

In Iraq, the dunam is 2,500 square metres (0.25 ha).[9]

Israel, Palestine, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey

In Israel, Palestine, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey the dunam is 1,000 square metres (10,764 sq ft), which is 1 decare. Before the end of the Ottoman Empire and during the early years of the British Mandate for Palestine, the size of a dunam was 919.3 square metres (9,895 sq ft), but in 1928, the metric dunam of 1,000 square metres (0.10 ha) was adopted, and this is still used.[10][11]

United Arab Emirates

The Dubai Statistics Center and Statistics Centre Abu Dhabi use the metric dunam (spelt as donum) for data relating to agricultural land use.[12] One donum equals 1000m2.

Variations

Other countries using a dunam of some size include Libya and Syria.

The metric dunam is particularly useful in hydrological calculations as 1 dönüm times 1 mm (a unit commonly used for measuring precipitation) equals exactly one cubic meter.

Conversions

A metric dönüm is equal to:

Comparable measures
See also: Acre

The Byzantine Greek stremma was the probable source of the Turkish unit. The zeugarion (Turkish çift) was a similar unit derived from the area plowed by a team of oxen in a day. The English acre was originally similar to both units in principle, although it developed separately.

See also

References
  1. V.L. Ménage, Review of Speros Vryonis, Jr. The decline of medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the process of islamization from the eleventh through the fifteenth century, Berkeley, 1971; in Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London) 36:3 (1973), pp. 659–661. at JSTOR (subscription required)
  2. Cowan, J. Milton; Arabic-English Dictionary, The Hans Wehr Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic (4th Edition, Spoken Languages Services, Inc.; 1994; p. 351)
  3. Λεξικό της κοινής Νεοελληνικής (Dictionary of Modern Greek), Ινστιτούτο Νεοελληνικών Σπουδών, Θεσσαλονίκη, 1998. ISBN 960-231-085-5
  4. Ménage, op.cit.
  5. Λεξικό, 1998
  6. Costas Lapavitsas, "Social and Economic Underpinning of Industrial Development: Evidence from Ottoman Macedonia", Ηλεκτρονικό Δελτίο Οικονομικής Ιστορίας "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 28 September 2007. Retrieved 26 August 2012.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  7. Мерне јединице у КЗ и КН (in Serbian). Republic Geodetic Authority of the Republic of Serbia. Archived from the original on 4 March 2012. Retrieved 6 September 2010.
  8. Department of Lands and Surveys web site http://www.moi.gov.cy/moi/dls (retrieved April 2014)
  9. Al-Shawi, Ibrahim (2006). A Glimpse of Iraq. ISBN 9781411695184.
  10. El-Eini, Roza I.M. (2006). "Currency and Measures". Mandated landscape: British imperial rule in Palestine, 1929–1948. Routledge. p. xxiii. ISBN 978-0-7146-5426-3. Retrieved 5 May 2009.
  11. Israel Central Bureau of Statistics. "explanatory notes" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 December 2013. Retrieved 2 August 2013.
  12. "Chapter 8: Agriculture Statistical Yearbook" (PDF). Dubai Statistics Center. 2009. p. 184. Retrieved 17 April 2019.
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