160 chapter five
The diversity could be attributed to two main reasons: the vast
geographical location and the active trade. The vast geographical
locations of the state allowed the incorporation of a wide variety of
seasons and weather conditions, which allowed in its turn a wide
variety of agricultural produce. To give a few examples, al-Jahiz
(d. 869) explained that as many as 360 different types of dates could
be found in the market of al-Basra, while al-Ansari stated that in
1400 A.C. in the near vicinity of a small village on the North African
coast there were 65 varieties of grapes, 36 types of pears, 28 kinds
of figs, 16 categories of apricots, and so forth, (Watson, 1981). What
seems to have been certain, as Watson says, is that the range of
useful plants available to cultivators was greatly increased in the early
centuries of Islam by the widespread diffusion of new plants and the
development of new strains (ibid.). Trade was another reason. The
expansion of trade between regions as well as with other countries,
helped create the conditions for diversity of products and activities.
This would make the task of imposing and collecting the tax in
kind, as well as in monetary units, rather complex, which must have
created a need for a complex tax system that ought to be well con-
trolled and administered. For example, complexity in relation to
issues such as tax rate, quantification of the tax base, threshold, direct
and indirect tax, ad valorem tax, and consumption of produce before
taxation, would suggest the need for good ministerial solutions that
had to be not only efficient but also in conformity with the Sharì"ah.
The need for expert jurists and the need for writing on taxation
would therefore become obvious—and need is the mother of invention.
The Change of the Structure of Land Ownership
Three issues lay at the heart of the structure of land ownership
between Muslims and non-Muslims, first, the right of Muslims to
purchase land from the non-Muslims, a right the exercise of which
became more notable during the Umayyads and Abbasids, second,
the right of the caliph to grant Muslims land in appreciation of ser-
vices, again, a right that was used during the two dynastic caliphates
on a much greater scale than that of the Rightly-Guided caliphate,
and, third, the right to the ownership of the previously neglected
ownerless land by whoever revived it. These three major factors
seemed to have played a considerable role in changing the structure
of land ownership in the Islamic state particularly during the Umayyads