Balāṭ - Balāṭ

Balat (Arabic:بلاط‎, Balāṭ, „[King's] court“) Is a city and the capital in the eastern part of the egyptian Sink ed-Dāchla in the New valley. Many of the houses in the old village center are still inhabited today.

background

Balāṭ is now the main town in the eastern part of the valley. The place has probably only existed since the second half of the 14th century. The name of the place is probably derived from the Arabic balad (Arabic:بلد) For Locality from. The name occasionally used by locals Balāṭ el-Malik means seat of power. The old village center is on the south side of the trunk road to Courage, the "modern" settlement extends on the north side.

Even when close with ʿAin Aṣīl and Qilāʿ eḍ-Ḍabba two sites from the ancient Egyptian 6th dynasty are located, this place is much younger. The place is mentioned for the first time by the Egyptian historian Ibn Duqmāq (1349-1407) in his list of 24 villages in the valley, in which rice is also grown.^[1] Balāṭ received the attribute large in contrast to the neighboring town el-Qaṣaba but not.

Of course, Balāṭ is already from them early travelers like the British in 1819 Archibald Edmonstone (1795–1871)^[2] and the Italian Bernardino Drovetti (1776–1852)^[3], 1820 to the French Frédéric Cailliaud (1787–1869)^[4], 1874 to the German Africa explorer Gerhard Rohlfs (1831–1896)^[5] and in 1908 by the US Egyptologist Herbert Eustis Winlock (1884–1950)^[6] been visited. Edmonstone reports out Bellatta Acacia trees, old adobe buildings that couldn't be dated, and a funeral. Drovetti reported about a large town that was surrounded by a wall and had 1,000 inhabitants. The increase in importance of Balā also contributed to the fact that the inhabitants of Tineida, who were repeatedly targeted by Bedouin attacks, relocated to Balāṭ in the second half of the 18th century. It was at this time that the residents of el-Qa begaba began to settle in Balā.^[7]John Gardner Wikinson (1797–1875), who visited the depression in 1825, reported about 800 male residents.^[8] Rohlfs explained that in the approximately 130 meters high Balāṭ including the surrounding hamlet like el-Bashandī 3,000 inhabitants lived and that there were two mosques and many sheik tombs here. For the year 1897 the British cartographer gave Hugh John Llewellyn Beadnell (1874–1944) had 1,784 inhabitants.^[9] According to Bliss, 6,197 residents lived here in 1983,^[10] while the 2006 census shows only 3,794 inhabitants.^[11]

The Composition of the population in Balāṭ it is very mixed. The Arabist Manfred Woidich reported on a conversation with an old man who was probably a hundred years old.^[12] The old man told of the original families, the Naǧǧarīn, Fuqaʾ and Abū ʿSēli, and of the newcomers. The Ṣabbaghīn came from Banī ʿAdī Asyūṭwho have favourited ʿĒlt Abū Salāma, Aulad Abū Sidhum and el-Qabābna from Siwawho came over to the Chatāiba Sōhāg and Bārīs from the Hejaz, the Rawābiḥ from Tineida as well as the Rawāschda and Dahīra from the west (Maghreb, west of the oasis?). The old man also reported that, of course, everything used to be better, the earth was more fertile. Nowadays religious values ​​are forgotten. Agriculture was practiced in a feudal manner. The ʿAround (Mayor) a third of the harvest had to be delivered. The harvest was done by hand and the feet were threshed. Unfortunately there were also plagues of locusts and rats.

The German ethnologist Frank Bliss called the 1899/1900 (1317 AH) born Imām Mubārīz el-Balāṭi, whose family lived in Balāṭ since the end of the 15th century. The Chatāiba, who immigrated from Bārīs at the beginning of the 18th century, achieved a significant rise in the middle of the 18th century. They also claimed to have brought true Islam to Balāṭ. In addition to the Thachīra clan from el-Qaṣaba, which originally came from the Marrakech area, three other families came to Balāṭ in the 18th century, the el-Gabārna, el-ʿAmāira and el-Maḥartha.

For the family history, in Balā. Die Door lintel are used, but only very late in 1779 (1193 AH) deploy.^[13]

getting there

The city is on both sides of the trunk road from Tineida to courage, the old village center directly on the south side. The distance from Mut is 32 kilometers and from Tineida 10 kilometers. It can be reached in courage from the bus stop at the central hospital by car or the infrequent public transport (buses, minibuses).

mobility

The old village center can only be explored on foot.

Tourist Attractions

The main attraction is the old one 25.5611729.264221 Village center(25 ° 33 '40 "N.29 ° 15 ′ 51 ″ E) in the south of today's city. An extensive hike is worthwhile here. In contrast to el-Qaṣr but this is not a museum. It is still inhabited. However, the residents are mostly old women and long-established families. The young people prefer to live in “modern” houses made of stone or concrete.

Also in Balā Auch they were Houses built from mud bricks. The walls were partially plastered. The houses consisted of two or three floors. The doors had a semicircular closure above the wooden lintel. The ceilings were made from palm trunks that were connected with palm leaves. The wooden beams above the doors tell of the owner of the house in one or two line inscriptions. The text was in calligraphy, the Nas.chī, executed. There are circular ornaments on the outer ends.

The one and a half meters wide Alleys are often overbuilt. In the area of ​​the overbuilding there are occasionally benches on the sides. Some bushes were planted in the clear areas.

There are at least two left in the old town Mosques. The new mosque and madrasa (school) consists of an approximately 3 meter high community room with a simple prayer niche, Mihrab, and a brick pulpit, Minbar. Here you can also find children at school. The old mosque is much flatter. Its ceiling is supported by squat columns.

Was in Balāṭ too Craft settled. A meanwhile dilapidated oil mill still bears witness to this.

To the south of the old village extends his graveyard, on which there are also several square domed tombs of respected sheikhs. These dome tombs were built from adobe bricks. The domes themselves have numerous light openings.

The most famous grave is that of the 25.55901329.2641451 Sheikhs Ḥamūda Saʿad Allāh Ḥamdān(25 ° 33 '32 "N.29 ° 15 ′ 51 ″ E), the 1540/1541 (948 AH) has died. The entrance to the tomb is in the east. The burial space is square, the edge length is about five meters. The lower part of the dome consists of two octagonal rings. The grave is plastered and whitewashed inside and out. On the walls there is a one-line inscription in blue color with verses from the Koran, traditions from the Prophet Muḥammad and verses from the Sheikh ʿAbd el-Dāʾim (see also el-Qaṣaba). There is a prayer niche on the east wall. In the middle are the remains of the cenotaph, the mock grave and the deceased.

accommodation

Accommodation is available in courage and in Qasr ed-Dachla.

trips

A visit to Balat can be combined with a visit to the mastaba tombs of the governors of the 6th dynasty in Qila 'ed-Dabba and the pharaonic settlement of ʿAin Aṣīl connect.

literature

• Castel, Georges; Al-Waqīl, ʿAbd al-Laṭīf: Mausolée du cheikh Ḥamūda à Balāṭ (Oasis de Daḫla). In:Annales Islamologiques (AnIsl), vol.20 (1984), Pp. 183-196, panels XXX-XXXIV.
• Bliss, Frank: Economic and social change in the “New Valley” of Egypt: on the effects of Egyptian regional development policy in the oases of the western desert. Bonn: Political working group for schools, 1989, Contributions to cultural studies; 12th, ISBN 978-3921876145 , P. 13, 97 f.
• Hivernel, Jacques: Balat: étude ethnologique d’une communauté rurale. Le Caire: Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale, 1996, Bibliothèque d'étude; 113.
• Radwan, Maha Brence Ahmad: Architecture, change, and conceptions of modernity in Balat, Dakhla Oases. Cairo: American University in Cairo, 2011. Dissertation, in English.

Individual evidence