The Old Woman's Wall
حائط العجوز
The wall that ringed Egypt's arable land along the desert edge like a dyke between sand and tilth — al-Umari walked beside it as far as Dendera and found it mudbrick, mostly buried or broken; the Egypt chronicles ascribe it to a queen named Diluk reaching to between al-Arish and Rafah, but he saw no trace there and no true builder is known 1.
At a glance
- Region
- Egypt & Nile
- Review
- Draft Completeness 1/5 · Help complete it
Overview
The Old Woman's Wall is a wall that encircles the lands of Egypt, running along the edge of the cultivated land, as if it were made as a barrier between the sand and the crops. Ibn Fadl Allah al-Umari walked along it as far as Dandara in Upper Egypt, and saw that it was built of brick, that most of it had been effaced, and that its broken parts outnumbered its connected ones. 2
Who built it
Al-Umari found in the books of the reports of Egypt that it was built by a woman named Dulluk, and that it reaches as far as the space between al-Arish and Rafah. But he said there is no trace of it there or in the lower parts of Egypt, and its builder is not known for certain. 2
Sources
- Masalik al-absar fi mamalik al-amsar — al-Umari (1924 printing), p. 239
- Masalik al-absar fi mamalik al-amsar — al-Umari (1924 printing), p.239
Cite this page
islam.museum contributors. “The Old Woman's Wall”. islam.museum, https://islam.museum/en/place/hait-al-ajuz/. CC BY-SA 4.0. Accessed 2026-10-17.