Fellah

Fellah

Fellah ( _ar. فلاح) (plural "Fellahin", فلاحين) is a peasant, farmer or agricultural laborer in the Middle East. The word derives from the Arabic word for "ploughman" or "tiller". During the time of the spread of Islam, it was used to distinguish between Arab settlers who were usually nomadic (i.e, "bedouin"), and the indigenous rural population (i.e, "fellahin") of the conquered territories, such as the Egyptians and the Syriacs of the Levant.

Fellahin in Egypt

After the 7th-century Arab invasion of Egypt a social hierarchy was created whereby Egyptians who converted to Islam acquired the status of mawali or "clients" to the ruling Arab elite, while those who remained Christian, the Copts, became dhimmis. The privilege enjoyed by the Arab minority continued in a modified form into the modern period in the countryside, where remnants of Bedouin Arab tribes lived alongside Egyptian fellahin. One author describes the social demographics of rural Upper Egypt as follows:

"Upper Egypt comprises the country's eight southernmost governorates. ... the region's history is one of isolated removal from the center of national life. The local relationships resulting from this centuries-old condition gave Upper Egypt an identity of its own within the modern Egyptian state. Alongside the even more ancient presence of Copts, tribal groupings dating from the Arab conquest combined to form a hierarchical order that placed two [minority] groups, the ashraf and the Arab, in dominating positions. These were followed by lesser tribes, with the [Egyptian] fellah at the bottom of the social scale(28) [...] Religion was central to the development of Upper Egyptian society. The ashraf claimed direct descent from the Prophet, while the Arabs traced their lineage to a group of tribes from Arabia. On the other hand, the status of the fellahin rested on the belief that they descended from Egypt's pre-Islamic community and had converted to Islam, a history that placed them inescapably beneath both the Ashraf and Arabs. [...] In Muslim as well as Christian communities, and particularly at the lower socio-economic levels, religious practices are strongly imbued with non-orthodox folk elements, some of pharaonic origin.cite journal | author=Dan Tsczhirgi | title=Marginalized Violent Internal Conflict In The Age Of Globalization: Mexico And Egypt | journal=Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ) | year=1999 | volume=21 | issue=3 | pages=3–34 | url=http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2501/is_3_21/ai_57476490"]

research on the life of Upper Egyptian farmers and concluded that there were observable continuities between the cultural and religious beliefs and practices of the fellahin and those of ancient Egyptians.cite news | first=Caryll | last=Faraldi | pages= | title=A genius for hobnobbing | date=11-17 May 2000 | publisher=Al-Ahram Weekly | url=http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2000/481/bk3_481.htm]

See also

*Falah Kafr El-Hanadwa, a cartoon character that appears on Elakhbar.

References


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Look at other dictionaries:

  • fellah — [ fela; fɛlla ] n. m. • 1661; ar. fallâh « cultivateur » ♦ Paysan; petit propriétaire agricole (en Égypte, en Afrique du Nord, etc.). Les fellahs. ● fellah nom masculin (arabe fallāḥ) Paysan arabe. ● fellah (difficultés) nom masculin ( …   Encyclopédie Universelle

  • Fellah — Fel lah, n.; pl. Ar. {Fellahin}, E. {Fellahs}. [Ar.] A peasant or cultivator of the soil among the Egyptians, Syrians, etc. W. M. Thomson. [1913 Webster] …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • Fellah — Fellah, in Ägypten u. Arabien die Landbebauer, im Gegensatz zu den nomadisirenden Beduinen …   Pierer's Universal-Lexikon

  • Fellah — (Plur. Fellahin, v. arab. felaha, pflügen, also »Bauer«), in Ägypten Name der Ackerbau treibenden Bevölkerung (s. Tafel »Afrikanische Völker I«, Fig. 5), fast drei Viertel derselben, die Nachkommen der alten Ägypter, wenngleich vielfach gemischt… …   Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon

  • Fellah — Fellāh oder Fellāch (arab., »Bauer«), die in Dörfern wohnende und Ackerbau treibende Bevölkerung Ägyptens, die Nachkommen der alten Ägypter …   Kleines Konversations-Lexikon

  • fellah — Egyptian peasant, 1743, from Arabic fallah plowman, from falaha “to till the soil.” …   Etymology dictionary

  • fellah — [fel′ə] n. pl. fellahs [fel′əz] or fellaheen [Ar fallāh (pl. fallāḥīn), peasant, farmer < falaḥa, to plow] a peasant or farm laborer in an Arab country …   English World dictionary

  • Fellah — Charles Gleyre, Trois fellahs, 1835 Un fellah[1] est un travailleur agricole du Moyen Orient, en Égypte et en Syrie en particulier. Pendant la période de diffusion de l islam au Moyen Orient, ce terme a été utilisé pour faire la dis …   Wikipédia en Français

  • fellah — is., esk., Ar. fellāḥ 1) Çiftçi 2) Mısır köylüsü Bir Mısır turnesinde zengin bir fellah kendisine tutulmuş, nikâhla almıştı. R. H. Karay 3) Arap …   Çağatay Osmanlı Sözlük

  • FELLAH —    the name applied contemptuously by the Turks to the agricultural labourer of Egypt; the Fellahin (pl. of Fellah) comprise about three fourths of the population; they are of good physique, and capable of much toil, but are, despite their… …   The Nuttall Encyclopaedia

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