Belly Dance Movements: Where Did They Come From?
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As a dancer, many times during class, my mind would start to wonder about the origins of that new bellydance step that the teacher was teaching. Where the flirtatious arm movements came from, the origins of instruments such as the veil and the saber, and why it is so mysterious and bewitching for viewers?
I have Arab heritage and given how Arab culture can sometimes be quite closed and traditionalist I have always found it amazing that belly dancing can be loaded with so much sensuality, More so than many other dances. Today I want to share with you, everything I found about it in my own research.
Enjoy this journey to ancient times!
The center of the Arabian dance lies in the hip, which is adorned with movements of the head, shoulders, arms and, naturally, the belly.
The spectacular nature of this dance lies in the synchrony of the hips with the music and the emotion that the dancer conveys, while the variety of steps and the dramatic effects are what make it striking.
In oriental dance, the movements are sinuous and rhythmic, the legs never rise above the level of the hips.
To dance, our ear must become accustomed to the rhythms of Arabic music, which has very different from Western tempos, as it consist of series of irregular minor patterns that we dancers must learn to follow and even anticipate.
The prehistoric origins of belly dance are a bit murky, but documented evidence takes us back to Egypt during the time period between 1200 and 1300 B.C., when this form was used by priestesses in the banks of Nile River
Those were times in which life passed as an incessant becoming, in which eternity was bathed by the waters of the Nile. Surrounded by a fertile land, by multiple magical gods, by a civilization in which glory was expressed with magnificent pyramids that sought to touch the sky.
Egyptian women danced both to pay tribute to the gods, to accompany the funeral processions, to celebrate and honor the pharaohs and to entertain at feasts and banquets.
One of the key themes in the oldest form of Arabian dance is one of human fertility being thought to be directly related to the earth. Women were attributed magical powers.
For example, in Central Anatolia and the Mediterranean (Turkey), thousands of years ago women had ritual dances in honor of these magical powers. Men were excluded from these rites.
Also, there were many fertility dances in Ancient Rome and Greece were dancers performed movements based on the rotation of belly and hips, and many of said dances were made in honor to goddesses from Syria and Turkey.
In Cyprus, birthplace of Aphrodite, women performed ritual dances accompanied by songs and percussion through which they put themselves in a trance.
These same rites of honouring gods, seeking fertility, took place in Mesopotamia, Phoenicia, Egypt, Arabia and India. During the 4th century A.D., Christianity came to dominate the Middle East, establishing a patriarchal society based on a male God and prohibiting all such female dances.
The Copts, who are Christians from Egypt, preserved the continuity of this dance through clandestine performances, incorporating certain modifications to align it with their newly adopted religious practices.
Some time after, the slaves took the dance, the songs and the music out of the temples, although the performers have not been able to remove the stigma attached to their profession.
Later, at the beginning of the Middle Ages, Islam was established, which signified a new eradication of dance in the streets. Resurfacing in the 18th century within the context of slave communities, this dance underwent a revitalization.
Subsequently, the influx of Turkish people, primarily consisting of individuals with enslaved backgrounds, contributed to the enhancement of its technical intricacy.
These slaves, retained in the ancient medieval caliphates, represented their power, so the beauty and skills of the dancers (singing, poetry, recitation) were valued.
These dancers were called awalim, highly respected and influential among the caliphs; they performed in the houses of rich people accompanied by denay, oud, qanun and tabla, while they interacted with zagats and swords of some spectators. Their shows were even complemented with snake charmers and magicians sometimes.
There was also another type of dancers, the ghawazee or Egyptian gypsies, who danced in the open air for audiences of lower social class, accompanied by nay, oud and tabla. The ghawazee are characterized by their preservation of the aesthetic essence of the dance, as well as the spiritual aspect of it.
These dancers often shared stage with magicians, minstrels and fortune tellers (they themselves made coffee reading) and their belly dance costumes have a lot of bright colors, ornaments, cons, pendants and bracelets. Their origin is Phoenician.
In its passage through different regions and epochs, the oriental dance was picking up steps and elements. For example, the cane used in oriental dance was taken from the tahtib dance, a kind of martial art of Egyptian men. The cane dance is known as raqs al asaya.
Egyptian Tahtib is said to be one of the oldest martial art in the world. Its full name is fann el Nazaha wal Tahtib, which means, “pursuit of righteousness through tahtib”. It consists of a combat between two or more opponents using a reed stick, tahtib, which measures between 1.30 and 6 meters long.
The tahtib dance is performed to the accompaniment of live music, to the Arabic rhythm of saidi, and includes jumps and gestures of blows, without contact with the body.
From the Persian dance, the delicate cadenced movements of the fingers and part of the coquetry with shoulders and arms were taken. In classical Persian dance, the dancer entered a state of higher consciousness in communion with the supreme being, to whom she dedicates the upward movements of her arms.
Likewise the shoulder shimmies when turning and the movements with the fingers apart are used in the Iranian dance known as bandary.
With respect to the saber, although it is believed that it was an element incorporated relatively recently to the dance, there are visual references of dancers with scimitars from the late nineteenth century, as this painting by the French orientalist painter Jean-Léon Gérôme entitled “Dance with saber in a cafe”:
The dance in which a tray with candles is balanced on the head was taken from the Moroccan dance known as raqs al seniyya, in which a tea tray is used.
This illustration by Charles Saalburg from the Chicago newspaper “The Inter Ocean” of 1893 shows different Midway Plaisance scenes from the Columbian Exposition held that year in Chicago. In the center appears a dancer balancing a tray with candles or a candelabra on her head, which could be raqs al shamadan but also raqs al seniyya.
Finally, the veil, one of the most magical elements, has been present in oriental dance since ancient times, as evidenced by this bronze statue from the Hellenistic period of a veiled dancer from the 2nd or 3rd century BC:
I hope this article has served to bring some light about the many mysteries that belly dancing has to offer. Until next time!
Other articles about Bellydance and Arabian dance:
Arabian dance, just like the many other dance styles, is not only about the movements. It has a wide range of costumes and accessories like …
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I studied diplomacy and law, but currently I am following my deepest passion which is being a writer. I have experience as a dancer in flamenco, belly dance, and ballet, and it is my pleasure to write about dancing!
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