Overview
This oral poem, also known as the Hilali epic, recounts the saga of the Bani Hilal Bedouin tribe and its migration from the Arabian Peninsula to North Africa in the tenth century. This tribe held sway over a vast territory in central North Africa for more than a century before being annihilated by Moroccan rivals. As one of the major epic poems that developed within the Arabic folk tradition, the Hilali is the only epic still performed in its integral musical form. Moreover, once widespread throughout the Middle East, it has disappeared from everywhere except Egypt. Since the fourteenth century, the Hilali epic has been performed by poets who sing the verses while playing a percussion instrument or a two-string spike fiddle (rabab). Performances take place at weddings, circumcision ceremonies and private gatherings, and may last for days. In the past, practitioners were trained within...
This record is imported from the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage public dataset as discovery metadata. ARED has not independently verified community authority, access protocols or local naming beyond the source record.
Community and Authority
- Communities
- Egypt
- Languages
- Not specified in UNESCO dataset
- Cultural territories
- Egypt
- Countries
- Egypt
How the System Works
This oral poem, also known as the Hilali epic, recounts the saga of the Bani Hilal Bedouin tribe and its migration from the Arabian Peninsula to North Africa in the tenth century. This tribe held sway over a vast territory in central North Africa for more than a century before being annihilated by Moroccan rivals. As one of the major...
Sources and Evidence
Imported from UNESCO DataHub dataset ich001. Field-level provenance is retained in the record metadata.
Field-Level Provenance
- title
- UNESCO DataHub field title_en
- preferredTitle
- UNESCO DataHub field title_fr
- summary
- UNESCO DataHub field description_en
- type
- UNESCO DataHub fields type_of_element_en and type_acronym
- countries
- UNESCO DataHub field countries, ISO codes resolved with ISO-3166 regional metadata
- categories
- ARED category inference from UNESCO concepts_primary_names, concepts_secondary_names and title
- relationships
- UNESCO concepts_primary_names, concepts_secondary_names, type fields and World Heritage links
- sourceUrl
- UNESCO DataHub field http_url_en
- rights
- UNESCO DataHub dataset metadata license and license_url
Original Source Metadata
Why This Record Is Credible
This public record is connected to 1 source and has been labelled Source Supported. ARED separates evidence sources from cultural authority so users can see both provenance and review limits.
Cultural Access
Use this as public discovery metadata only. It does not replace community authority or local access protocols.
Relationships
Review and Corrections
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