Dervish facts for kids
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A dervish or darvesh is a type of Sufi.
It is someone living a Sufi Muslim ascetic way or "Tariqah". They are poor, and live simply. In this respect, dervishes are most similar to mendicant friars in Christianity, or Hindu/Buddhist/Jain sadhus.
Whirling dervishes
The whirling dance that is associated with dervishes is best known in the West by the performances of the Mevlevi order in Turkey. It is part of a ceremony known as the Sema. It is also done by other orders. The Sema is only one of many Sufi ceremonies performed to try to reach religious ecstasy (majdhb, fana).
The name Mevlevi comes from the Persian poet Rumi, who was a dervish himself. This practice, though not intended as entertainment, has become a tourist attraction in Turkey.
Images for kids
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Ottoman Dervish portrayed by Amedeo Preziosi, 1860s circa, Muzeul Naţional de Artă al României
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The dance of the dervishes, Athens, Ottoman Greece, by Dodwell
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A Mahdist Dervish from Sudan (1899)
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Dervish Azerbaijani rug, XIX c. Tabriz school, State Museum of Azerbaijan Carpet and Applied Art
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Ottoman Dervishes portrayed by Amedeo Preziosi in Istanbul, 1857
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A Qajar-era Persian dervish, seen here from an 1873 depiction of Tehran's Grand Bazaar
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An Ottoman Dervish in Istanbul, 1878
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Dervishes photographed by William H. Rau near Damascus, circa 1903
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A Palestinian Dervish in 1913
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Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi, leader of the Sudanese Dervishes
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Sufi kashkuls were often made from a coco de mer which ordinary beggars would have difficulty to find
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Kashkul, or Beggar’s Bowl, with Portrait of Dervishes and a Mounted Falconer, A.H. 1280. Brooklyn Museum
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A Gathering of Dervishes in the Mughal Empire
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A family of Dervishes, possibly by Antoin Sevruguin (between 1876 and 1925)
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The dance of the dervishes, Athens
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Sufi dervishes in Omdurman, Sudan
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Sayyid Mohammed Abdullah Hassan, head of Darawiish
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A Sheikh of the Rifa'i Sufi Order
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See also
In Spanish: Derviche para niños
