Qati'a (Land Grant)

Qati'a (allotment) in Basra and al-Sawad is land that the sultan or the governor allots to a man, who revives it and brings it into cultivation. This is what the report in Futuh al-buldan states. ¹

Ziyad ibn Abi Sufyan used to allot a man an allotment and leave him for two years; if he cultivated it, well; if not, he took it back from him. He used to say that only what has been cultivated is carried out. Ziyad was the first to uproot the 'uthm (a thorny plant) in Basra, and he allotted land to people in the villages whose inhabitants had died. ¹

Some governors' allotments reached thousands of jurib (units of land): the allotment of Hilal ibn Ahwaz was eight thousand jurib, and that of Abd Allah ibn Umayr eight thousand. The surveyors of al-Mansur measured the allotment of the family of Abu Bakra, which was a hundred jurib, and found it to be a thousand. They allowed them to keep a hundred in their hands and took back the rest. ¹