Charles Gleyre, Three Fellahs (fr. Trois fellahs), 1835

Fellah (Arabic: 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 Aramaeans/Syriacs of the Levant. Falah (فلاح) is the Arabic word for success (especially from self-improvement), happiness and well-being. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Categories: Stub | 1806 births | 1874 deaths | Swiss painters | Natives of Vaud ... | Come and take it, slogan of the Texas Revolution 1835 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... A map showing countries commonly considered to be part of the Middle East The Middle East is a region comprising the lands around the southern and eastern parts of the Mediterranean Sea, a territory that extends from the eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... An Arab (Arabic: ) is a member of a complexly defined ethnic group who identifies as such on the basis of one or more of either genealogical, political, or linguistic grounds. ... A Bedouin man on a hillside at Mount Sinai Bedouin, derived from the Arabic ( ), a name for a desert-dweller, is a term generally applied to Arab nomadic pastoralist groups, who are found throughout most of the desert belt extending from the Atlantic coast of the Sahara via the Western... The Aramaeans, or Arameans, were a Semitic, semi-nomadic and pastoralist people who originated and had lived in upper Mesopotamia and Syria. ... The factual accuracy of this article is disputed. ... The Levant The Levant (IPA: /lÉ™vænt/) is an imprecise geographical term historically referring to a large area in the Middle East south of the Taurus Mountains, bounded by the Mediterranean Sea on the west, and by the northern Arabian Desert and Upper Mesopotamia to the east. ...

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: Mawali is a term in ancient Arabic used to address non-Arab Muslims. In the second half of the sixth century, the Malawi were considered the third class in society with the Sayyids at the top followed by the free tribesmen. ... Religions Coptic Orthodox Christianity, Coptic Catholicism, Protestantism Scriptures Bible Languages Mari, Coptic, Arabic, English, French, German A Copt (Coptic: , literally: Egyptian Christian) is a native Egyptian Christian. ... A Dhimmi, or Zimmi (Arabic ذمّي), as defined in classical Islamic legal and political literature, is a person living in a Muslim state who is a member of an officially tolerated non-Muslim religion. ... A Bedouin man on a hillside at Mount Sinai Bedouin, derived from the Arabic ( ), a name for a desert-dweller, is a term generally applied to Arab nomadic pastoralist groups, who are found throughout most of the desert belt extending from the Atlantic coast of the Sahara via the Western...

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.^[1]

Egyptian fellah.

Comprising 60% of the Egyptian population [1], the fellahin lead humble lives and continue to live in mud-brick houses like their ancient ancestors. Their percentage was much higher in the early 20th century, before the large influx of Egyptian fellahin into urban towns and cities. In 1927, anthropologist Winifred Blackman, author of The Fellahin of Upper Egypt, conducted ethnographic 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.^[2] Image File history File links Download high resolution version (600x900, 255 KB) http://www. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (600x900, 255 KB) http://www. ... Ethnography (from the Greek ethnos = nation and graphe = writing) refers to the qualitative description of human social phenomena, based on months or years of fieldwork. ...

"Fille Fellahin." A Victorian-era postcard of a young Fellahin girl of Egypt.

Image File history File links Fellahin. ... Image File history File links Fellahin. ...

References

1. ^ Dan Tsczhirgi (1999). "Marginalized Violent Internal Conflict In The Age Of Globalization: Mexico And Egypt". Arab Studies Quarterly (ASQ) 21 (3): 3–34. 
2. ^ Faraldi, Caryll. "A genius for hobnobbing", Al-Ahram Weekly, 11-17 May 2000.