Hittin

The village was located on the banks of a small wadi, at the northern foot of Mount Hittin. Historically, the village was strategically and commercially significant because it dominated the Plain of Hittin. The plain opened onto the coastal lowlands of Lake Tiberias, to the east, and to the west was linked to the plains of lower Galilee through mountain passes (see photos). These plains, with their east-west passages, had served as routes for commercial caravans and military invasions throughout the ages. The village may have been built over the Canaanite town of Siddim or Ziddim (Joshua 19:35), which in the third century B.C. acquired the Hebrew name Kefar Hattin ('village of grain'). It was known by the name Kfar Hittaya in the Roman period and served as a rabbinical seat in the fourth century. The Plain of Hittin was the site of the famous battle of Hittin (1187), in which Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi (Saladin) defeated the Crusaders' armies, thereby securing the entire Galilee.

Hittin also was the place where numerous prominent figures in the early Islamic period were born or buried. Their names were linked to the village by a number of early Arab and Muslim geographers and chroniclers, including Yaqut al-Hamawi (d. 1228) and al-Ansari al-Dimashqi (d. 1327), who himself was called the Shaykh of Hittin. Ali al-Dawadari, the writer, Qur'anic exegetist, and calligrapher died in the village in 1302. In 1596, Hittin was a village in the nahiya of Tiberias (liwa' of Safad) with a population of 605. It paid taxes on a number of crops, including wheat, barley, and olives, as well as on other types of produce, such as goats and beehives. In the early nineteenth century, the Swiss traveler Burckhardt described it as a small village whose houses were built of stone. In the late nineteenth century, Hittin was circled by fruit and olive trees; the village's 400 residents cultivated part of the surrounding plain.

The modern village layout was triangular in shape. Its streets were level and straight due to the flatness of the site. The village center, located in the northwest, included a small market, an elementary school (established around 1897 under Ottoman rule) and a mosque for the entirely Muslim population. Religious landmarks in the village area included the shrine of the prophet (nabi) Shu'ayb on the southwestern outskirts of Hittin. This shrine was especially sacred to people of the Druze faith, who made a pilgrimage to the site each April. The shrine had several rooms for visitors and a prayer hall that was believed to house the tomb and footprint of the prophet Shu'ayb. A spring near the shrine provided the visitors with drinking water.

The land was well-endowed with good soil and enjoyed plentiful rain and ground water, especially in the northern part of the plain, where there was a group of springs and wells. Combined with the moderate weather, these attributes led to the development of a successful agricultural economy. Most villagers engaged in agriculture, which was based on grain and fruits, including olives. In 1944 a total of 10,253 dunums was planted in cereals; 1,936 dunums were irrigated or used for orchards. The village was constructed over the archaeological remains of earlier settlements; these remains were scattered throughout the village. There were also a number of khirbas in the vicinity.