Bibit (Atjehnese bidjeh) was the seed padi used for planting a rice field in Atjeh, and — because the size of a field was expressed by the quantity of seed needed to plant it — also the effective unit of land measurement.
As a measure of land
The size of a rice field in Atjeh was indicated by the quantity of bibit needed on average for its planting, or estimated to be needed, measured in goentja, naleh, gantang and areh. With one naleh about 1,600 square metres were planted, and good sawah’s yielded on average fifty times the quantity of seed, poor fields fifteen times.
In contracts and levies
- The boeët oemòng was assessed at one naleh of padi per naleh of bidjeh.
- Under the thiplah-tano contract, a minimum working area of five naleh of bidjeh — about 0.8 hectare — was required of the immigrant, who received the seed as part of his pangkaj.
- Under mawaih bahagi lhée and aboen meu’oeë the giver supplied the bibit.
- Under the haq toeleuèng the proven original possessor had to supply the bibit as counter-obligation; in the Siglische variant, a cultivator who himself provided the bibit for perennial crops became entitled to half their yield.
See Also
Source
Het recht op den grond in Atjeh, by D. W. N. de Boer, dated Scheveningen, November 1931, pp. 59-80. Offprint DLP-141, Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, ‘s-Gravenhage; Bibliotheek KITLV accession 0060 4460 60 081470 428.