Female Headwear
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Although Islam enjoins both men and women to cover their hair, people of all religions do so throughout the region. The style of head covering gives a lot of information about the wearer's location - in both time and space, their status, and their religion.
In many cultures women also veil their faces. This can vary from pulling their headscarf across their face to elaborate masks. Veiling is covered in a separate section. The simplest head covering is to pull part of the other clothing over the head. Examples would include wrapped clothes such as the izar, the hood of the burnous, or the sleeve of some Bedouin thobes. There are also mantles that are pulled over the head such as the haik, chadors and milaya lef. Parker  Izar , Palestine 1926  Chador Iran 1957  Haik, Algiers 1928  Milaya lef Cairo 1920s  Woman and child, Algeria, 1967 |
HeadscarvesThe next level is a rectangular scarf which can be pinned around the face, wrapped around the head, held by a headband or formed into a bag. These various scarves can have a range of local names. The general Arabic term for headscarf is khimar. But these are also known as hattah, zurband, shash, qun`ah, mandil and a range of other terms.Kurds and some coastal women from Oman also wear wrapped scarves like small turbans under a veil. Al-Muhajabah, Weir, Kennet  khimar pinned under chin and covering hair, Iran 1921  shash Palestine  headscarf with headband Iran 1975  hatta folded into a bag Egypt 1997 |
HatsThere are also a range of formed hats. In many places women wear skullcaps (taqiyeh) - sometimes with a veil. In some parts of Palestine, married women and widows wear a tarbush shaped hat covered in coins (shatweh). While to the north they wear a coin covered bonnet (smadeh) and another horseshow shape with more coins (saffeh). In Lebanon married women wore a tantour - like a fairy princess hat. In the rural south of the Arabian Peninsula women (like the men) wear conical straw hats. In Iran unmarried nomads wear pill box hats.Weir, Eid, Kennet, Anawalt  Shatweh covered by veil Palestine 1926  Smadeh and saffeh Palestine 1929  Unisex straw hat over veil South Yemen 1985 |
Status MarkersAs well as varying by location, headwear is also used to signal marital status, religion and class. For instance, in some Bedouin groups unmarried women wear the hattah like a bag while married women wear it rolled and folded as a headband (`asbeh). In northern Palestine unmarried girls wear a bonnet (malas) while the married women wear long flowing veils. In some areas when the girls reach marriageable age they switch to a wuqa which is like a simple version of the smadeh - basically a bonnet with a few coins.In Northern Palestine while their neighbours wear scarves (hattah) or trains (zurband) held in place with a headband (`asbeh), Druze women wear white veils only - and the Bedouin women wear dark blue or black veils. The Palestinian festive veil (tarbi`ah) is very elaborate. It always includes a black piece with fringe and tassels but the village version also has embroidered panel (naqleh) while the town version does not. Weir, National  Bedouin married and unmarried women 1937  Young woman wearing wuqa Palestine 1938  Woman with hattah and `asbeh Palestine 1929 |
Other general types of clothing:
unmodified lengths cloaks sleeveless tunics skirts men's headwear women's headwear
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