Deir Dibwan
| Deir Debwan | |
|---|---|
| Other transcription(s) | |
| • Arabic | دير دبوان |
| • Also spelled | Deir Debwan (official) Dayr Debwan (unofficial) |
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 Deir Debwan
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| Coordinates: 31°54′39″N 35°16′14″E / 31.91083°N 35.27056°ECoordinates: 31°54′39″N 35°16′14″E / 31.91083°N 35.27056°E | |
| Governorate | Ramallah & al-Bireh |
| Government | |
| • Type | Village council |
| Population (2006) | |
| • Jurisdiction | 5,252 |
| Name meaning | "The Monastery of the Divan" |
Deir Dibwan (Arabic: دير دبوان) is a Palestinian town in the Ramallah and al-Bireh Governorate in the central West Bank 7 kilometers east of Ramallah. According to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics the town had a population of approximately 5,252 inhabitants in mid-year 2006. There were 5,016 people from Deir Dibwan living abroad. Deir Dibwan was built close to the ruins of Et-Tell.
The word "Deir" means monastery (church or temple) and the word "dibwan" came from the name of the "divan", or Council. It has also been called Deir Dubwan, where "Dubwan" is a proper name.
Et-Tell is a mound located just west of the village.
Potsherds from the Middle Bronze Age, Iron Age II, Hellenistic/Roman, Byzantine, Crusader/Ayyubid and Mamluk era have been found.
Deir Dibwan have been identified with the Crusader site named Dargebaam, or Dargiboan.
Potsherds from the early Ottoman era have been found.
In the late Ottoman period, in 1838, the American scholar Edward Robinson described Deir Dibwan as being "tolerably wealthy", and reportedly the producer of great quantities of figs.
The French explorer Victor Guérin visited the village in July 1863, and described it as having five hundred inhabitants, situated on a rocky plateau. The highest point of the plateau was occupied by the remains of an old construction, which people referred to as Ed-Deir (the Monastery). He also note several cisterns dug into the rock, which he assumed dated from antiquity. An Ottoman village list of about 1870 showed that "Der Diwan" had 161 houses and a population of 459, though the population count included only men.
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