Dhafeer..a crown inlaid on the heads of Mauritanian women

“That was 6 decades ago.” Maryam bint Sayed Muhammad remembers the first “diffuse” of her hair when she was twelve, on that day her mother told her that she would send her to the “teachers” to braid her head as girls do.

“I was almost flying with joy and pride that I became old,” says Maryam, speaking to Sky News Arabia.

And she added: “In the teachers’ tent, the woman who will braid her head has started preparing some natural preparations, such as Al-Masid, where she grinds some green asparagus leaves in small bowls until they become like gel, and puts butter extracted from curdled milk in other bowls, and in a third substance called (Amad). It is extracted from the roots of dead trees, then I braided the sweetest daffodil.”

History and types

Plaiting hair is an ancient Arab custom. The Arabs, men and women, used to let their hair hang down on the shoulders. They were braided in braids that they called centuries. The Arab kings Al-Mundhir bin Maa Al-Sama’, the grandfather of Al-Nu’man bin Al-Mundhir, who was known as Dhul-Qarnayn because he had two braids on the side of his head .

In Africa, braids were a means of beautification and a way of expression, and a person’s braid may express his social status or indicate his tribe and position in the tribe, and so on.

Because Mauritania is located between the Arab and African worlds, “the braid” was one of the most important means of adornment for Mauritanian women, as every age group of women was distinguished by a special type of braid.

Braids vary according to age and occasion, according to Amna Bint Humaidat, an elderly woman in her seventies who used to be Dhofara. The little girl begins with “twisting,” which is hair that is left in the part of the head from the forehead to the nape and is braided in small braids, and it may have a “testicle” or ‘custom’ or pods.

Bint Humaidat continues, speaking to Sky News Arabia: “When the girl wins, she is said to be friqa or wrapped, and after she is over ten, we get her Sana Mana.”

What is Sana Mana?

Amna Bint Hmeidat answers: “Sana Mana Dhafra Al-Azab (little girls), we divide the hair from the middle and make the front braids, while the back half makes delicate braids from both sides of the head in the direction of the hair part, and it is one of the most beautiful braids, especially for the dark hair. And when the girl grows, the nails vary. Such as scissors and tapestry, and the forehead is decorated with different kinds of beads.”

And beautician Mubaraka Ahmed Karama considers “the braid is one of the most important types of traditional adornment for Mauritanian women, as it has been distinguished through the ages by its beauty and the accuracy of its detail in line with each era.”

Mubarak explained to Sky News Arabia that “Al-Zhafeer in Mauritania has evolved over time to harmonize with the beauty of women in every era, until it has reached, in our time, the peak of its development while preserving its original details. Girls race to it on holidays and social occasions, as well as (summarize) it has become a mainstay for creating curly tufts of hair, which is one of the most important contemporary fashion hairstyles.

bridal pterygium

With all this quest for renewal and development, beauty expert Mubaraka Karama notes that “there is an important thing that still retains its originality and beauty, which is the bride’s braid, in which the ladies are divided into two categories: a category that depends on the natural hair of women and makes interconnecting braids to form a basic support for installing beads and jewels to look like a studded crown. On the woman’s head, leaving braids studded with beautiful beads, while the second type has become more and depends on ready-made braids that are fixed above the natural hair so that the bride can remove them whenever she wants.