Al-Sarafand
| al-Sarafand | |
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 al-Sarafand
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| Arabic | الصرفند |
| Name meaning | from a personal name |
| Also spelled | Sarepta Yudee |
| Subdistrict | Haifa |
| Coordinates | 32°38′48″N 34°56′08″E / 32.64667°N 34.93556°ECoordinates: 32°38′48″N 34°56′08″E / 32.64667°N 34.93556°E |
| Palestine grid | 144/228 |
| Population | 290 (1945) |
| Area | 5,409 dunams 5.4 km² |
| Date of depopulation | 16 July 1948 |
| Cause(s) of depopulation | Military assault by Yishuv forces |
| Secondary cause | Influence of nearby town's fall |
| Current localities | Tzrufa |
Al-Sarafand (Arabic: الصرفند) was a Palestinian Arab village near the Mediterranean shore south of Haifa. In Ottoman tax records, it is shown that the village had a population of 61 inhabitants in 1596. According to a land and population survey by Sami Hadawi, al-Sarafand's population was 290 in 1945, entirely Arab.
Pottery remains from the late Roman era and Byzantine era have been found here.
Al-Sarafand was known to the Crusaders as Sarepta Yudee, but is not known when the village was founded, or how the name originated. In the Crusader period a chapel and a fortress was built on the site. The site was recaptured by Ayyubid forces in 1187-1188. The village appears in the waqf of the tomb (turba) and madrasa of amir Qurqamaz in Egypt.
From Ottoman records it is known that in 1596 Sarafand was a village in the nahiya ("subdistrict") of Shafa, ( liwa' ("district") of Lajjun), with a population of 61. Villagers paid taxes to the authorities for the crops that they cultivated, which included wheat, barley, summer crops such as corn, beans, melons, and vegetables, and raising goats.
In 1859 the village of Sarafand was described as being situated on a ridge between a plain and the beach. Consul Rogers estimated that 150 people lived in it and cultivated 16 faddans. Four years later, Victor Guérin stated that the population size was 400.
According to the Palestine Exploration Fund's Survey of Western Palestine, who visited in 1873; "North of this village there is a system of rock- cut tombs, sixteen in all. Eight have each three loculi under arcosolia, and in three cases the rolling stones which closed the doors lie beside them. One of these stones was 3 feet diameter, and 1 foot thick, weighing probably about 6 cwt. Five of the tombs are single loculi, open in front, cut in the face of the cliff under arcosolia; two of the tombs have only two loculi each, and one is blocked up. This group presents the best examples found by the Survey party of the rolling stone arrangement for a tomb door."
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Wikipedia