Dôseh

Dôseh, an Arabic word meaning 'treading,' denotes a remarkable ceremony, which, until its suppression in 1884, used to take place in Cairo annually on the feast of the prophet's birth, in the third month of the Mohammedan year. A party of dervishes of the Sa'di order, to the number of a hundred or more, lay down on their faces, side by side, with their arms doubled under their foreheads. A dozen more ran along upon their comrades' prostrate backs, beating drums, and shouting 'Allah!' Then the sheikh of the order, mounted on a good-sized horse, which ambled with a fine action, rode along upon the line of bodies, from whom audible prayers could be heard proceeding. The horse trod upon each man twice, yet, as the sheikh passed on, those behind rose up apparently unhurt. This has however been disputed, and evidence has been produced of considerable injury inflicted by the iron-shod hoofs. It was in consequence of this that the Khedive Tewfik suppressed this singular religious rite. See Lane, Modern Egyptians, xxiv.; Butler, Court Life in Egypt.