DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49270#0041
SiwAN Customs.
21
houses with palm fronds four or five meters in length, and attach torches to these fronds.
On the night of Ashoura all these torches are lighted, while the young boys and girls sing
“Eedi, eedi, ya hamoudi fok djiridi.” 71 They are given presents of fruit, sweets, pigeons,
all of which are hung on a frame work made of palm branches. The palm branches are
stained red. The illumination of the town, accompanied by the singing of the boys and
girls and by the intoxication of the fellaheen continues for three nights. On the last
night they sing:
“Ashoura has left us; we hope that it comes next year
and finds us healthy and all living.”
Previously (i. e. about 50 years ago) the celebration lasted for seven days. All of the
people used to ascend the roofs of the house to dance and sing, while now only the children
do this.
Springs and Wells.72 The springs and wells are generally inhabited by ginns.73 Those
beginning of the newly accepted lunar calendar those popular customs with which they had been wont to usher in
their solar year. The 'Ashhra is an important festival in Khargah and Dakhlah. “On this day everyone receives
a present as on our Christmas day. A girl is given a pigeon, a boy a chicken, a woman the hen of a turkey, duck or
other big bird, according to the wealth of the family, while a man receives a cock bird of the same species. All the
eggs in the village are saved up for this feast and for a week before it is almost impossible to buy any. The eggs are
colored and hard boiled and used by the people to pelt each other with in the streets. A kind of game also is played
in which two people knock their eggs together — the egg which breaks first being taken by the owner of the stronger
egg. At night all the doors in the village are left open, as the natives believe — as they do in the Nile Valley — that
on this evening a mule laden with gold “baghallet el ashar” (the mule of the 10th) travels through the country and
may enter one of the houses”; W. J. H. King, op. cit., p. 166.
71 Dr. 'Abd Allah here appears again to be copying C. V. B. Stanley (loc. cit.) who gives this refrain as “Eedi,
Eedi, ya hamudi, Fok Djiridi.” This appears to be meant for the Arabic
“My hand, my hand, O Hamtidt, is above (or on) my palm frond!”
unless is to be taken in the rarer sense of completes annus instead of ramus palmae foliis nudatus. Captain
Stanley (loc. cit.) gives these additional details for this 'Ashura rite: “It is customary for friends to exchange at this
season what are almost exactly like our Christmas trees. . . .They differ for boys and girls. The girls’ tree, called
the Busbasa (window) is a square framework of palm branch erected on a stout pole in a horizontal position. To
the corners and along the four sides are fixed torches, and the framework is hung with presents of fruit, mint, sweets
or pigeons. The boys’ tree, the Zarabya, is decorated in the same way, but the framework is in the shape of a cross.
Both have patterns worked on them by stripping the bark and staining the exposed surface with Inab el Dyb, or
pomegranate juice.” The word busbassa calls for comment. It does not mean “window ”, the Siwan for which is
altin (lit. “eye”). Nor is it credible that it is, as G. Steindorff affirms (vide supra, note -10 ad fin.'), a special inter-
rogative. Its use in connection with divination by a burning palm frond dummy and with lighted palm front standards
suggests a connection with palm fronds, or some object made from them. A consulation of the Arabic lexica under
bs, bsbs, bs, bsb$, and of the Berber dictionaries, seems to yield nothing conclusive.
72 Vide supra, n. 29; 37.
73 The Siwan ginn are some of them well-disposed, while others are malignant. All are capricious and to be feared.
Some say that the good ginn live in the air: those that dwell underground are some of them good, some of them evil.
Thunder and lightning are the voices and whips of the kindly ginn when angered. The ginn haunt desert places,
21
houses with palm fronds four or five meters in length, and attach torches to these fronds.
On the night of Ashoura all these torches are lighted, while the young boys and girls sing
“Eedi, eedi, ya hamoudi fok djiridi.” 71 They are given presents of fruit, sweets, pigeons,
all of which are hung on a frame work made of palm branches. The palm branches are
stained red. The illumination of the town, accompanied by the singing of the boys and
girls and by the intoxication of the fellaheen continues for three nights. On the last
night they sing:
“Ashoura has left us; we hope that it comes next year
and finds us healthy and all living.”
Previously (i. e. about 50 years ago) the celebration lasted for seven days. All of the
people used to ascend the roofs of the house to dance and sing, while now only the children
do this.
Springs and Wells.72 The springs and wells are generally inhabited by ginns.73 Those
beginning of the newly accepted lunar calendar those popular customs with which they had been wont to usher in
their solar year. The 'Ashhra is an important festival in Khargah and Dakhlah. “On this day everyone receives
a present as on our Christmas day. A girl is given a pigeon, a boy a chicken, a woman the hen of a turkey, duck or
other big bird, according to the wealth of the family, while a man receives a cock bird of the same species. All the
eggs in the village are saved up for this feast and for a week before it is almost impossible to buy any. The eggs are
colored and hard boiled and used by the people to pelt each other with in the streets. A kind of game also is played
in which two people knock their eggs together — the egg which breaks first being taken by the owner of the stronger
egg. At night all the doors in the village are left open, as the natives believe — as they do in the Nile Valley — that
on this evening a mule laden with gold “baghallet el ashar” (the mule of the 10th) travels through the country and
may enter one of the houses”; W. J. H. King, op. cit., p. 166.
71 Dr. 'Abd Allah here appears again to be copying C. V. B. Stanley (loc. cit.) who gives this refrain as “Eedi,
Eedi, ya hamudi, Fok Djiridi.” This appears to be meant for the Arabic
“My hand, my hand, O Hamtidt, is above (or on) my palm frond!”
unless is to be taken in the rarer sense of completes annus instead of ramus palmae foliis nudatus. Captain
Stanley (loc. cit.) gives these additional details for this 'Ashura rite: “It is customary for friends to exchange at this
season what are almost exactly like our Christmas trees. . . .They differ for boys and girls. The girls’ tree, called
the Busbasa (window) is a square framework of palm branch erected on a stout pole in a horizontal position. To
the corners and along the four sides are fixed torches, and the framework is hung with presents of fruit, mint, sweets
or pigeons. The boys’ tree, the Zarabya, is decorated in the same way, but the framework is in the shape of a cross.
Both have patterns worked on them by stripping the bark and staining the exposed surface with Inab el Dyb, or
pomegranate juice.” The word busbassa calls for comment. It does not mean “window ”, the Siwan for which is
altin (lit. “eye”). Nor is it credible that it is, as G. Steindorff affirms (vide supra, note -10 ad fin.'), a special inter-
rogative. Its use in connection with divination by a burning palm frond dummy and with lighted palm front standards
suggests a connection with palm fronds, or some object made from them. A consulation of the Arabic lexica under
bs, bsbs, bs, bsb$, and of the Berber dictionaries, seems to yield nothing conclusive.
72 Vide supra, n. 29; 37.
73 The Siwan ginn are some of them well-disposed, while others are malignant. All are capricious and to be feared.
Some say that the good ginn live in the air: those that dwell underground are some of them good, some of them evil.
Thunder and lightning are the voices and whips of the kindly ginn when angered. The ginn haunt desert places,