The Fatimid caliphate was an Arab Ismaili Shiite Islamic dynasty that was established in the 10th to 12th centuries (909 to 1171 C.E). It traversed a large area of North Africa ranging from the Red Sea in the east to the Atlantic Ocean in the west, to Sicily. Just like the Abbasids, the Fatimids were a dynasty named after a person with a direct lineage to the prophet Muhammad who was in this case his daughter Fatima az-Zahrāʾ. The dynasty was founded in 909 C.E by Abdullāh al-Mahdī Billa who legitimized his claim through descent from the Prophet by way of the Prophet’s daughter Fātima az-Zahrāʾ and her husband ʿAlī ibn-Abī-Tālib, hence the name al-Fātimiyyūn “Fatimid”.

The dynasty started out as small-scale missionaries advocating for the Ismaili branch of Shiaism across the Arab East in Kufa but was persecuted by the Abbasids, thus changing course to the west in North Africa until they gathered a substantial amount of momentum and followers enough to engulf the majority of the western parts of the Arab world and expand their territories further eastward into Egypt, the Levant, and Hejaz. Their success in overtaking large parts of Islamic lands was owed to the Abbasid caliphate becoming quite fragmented as their authority and dominance dwindled, thus losing several of their territories to different autonomous Islamic dynasties that managed to drive them out.

The Fatimids established their first base in the Maghreb region, mostly in Tunisia 909–973 C.E and finally in Egypt where they built their capital city, Cairo 973-1171 C.E. The structures, monuments, and cultural heritage left by the Fatimids impacted Egypt’s history and is still celebrated and extolled to this day by Egyptians.

Scholars claim that Jews, Christians, and other ethnic minorities enjoyed a great deal of religious tolerance during the Fatimid period. Many Jewish scholars and philosophers produced their most illustrious bodies of work during the Fatimid era, even going as far as occupying high positions in the caliphal court, a privilege that was rarely obtained previously in a strictly Sunni-adherent caliphate.

This leniency perhaps stemmed from several reasons; the Fatimids ousted their contemporary rivals, the Sunni Abbasids from several consequential territories which recognized them as the nominal sovereigns of the Islamic empire for a long time, disturbing the religious, political, and social status quo of the region. Not to mention, the Fatimids had to face the reality of being a minority sub-sect ruling over a majority Sunni sect subjects, so they had to overcompensate for their undermined position amongst the Sunni populous by being overtly tolerant to other faith groups and ethnic communities to consolidate their authority.

This tolerant attitude is displayed in the Fatimids’ lenient attitude towards the implementation of the laws of Ghiyār (differentiating dress code), save for one despotic ruler, Al-Hakim bi ‘Amr il-lah, who was described by contemporary historians to have possessed an eccentric and erratic behavior, whose tyranny was not only targeted towards non-muslims but also his Sunni advisors and common subjects. 

It’s reported that he persecuted Jews and Christians to an unprecedented degree and demolished many places of worship, imposed strict adherence to the Ghiyār– in this case, the mintaq or zunnar “belt” and ‘imāmah “turban”, both in black. In addition, Jews must wear a wooden calf necklace, and Christians an iron cross. In public baths, Jews must replace the calf with a bell. In addition, dhimmi women had to wear two different colored shoes, one red, and one black. These tyrannical measures remained in place until he died in 1014 CE and dhimmis returned to their previous privileged lives.

The Fatimids found themselves amidst a clash with another rivaling Sunni dynasty besides the Abbasids, the emerging Turkish Seljuk dynasty, on top of the looming threat of the Byzantine empire vying for regional dominance. The Fatimids reached their political zenith under the caliph Al-Mustansir (1036-1094 C.E) and controlled most of the Arabian Peninsula and even Baghdad for a time.

The economy flourished since Egypt had grown into a hub for trade between India and the countries of the Mediterranean. Soon Cairo surpassed Baghdad in size and magnificence. The city became the center for the production of lustre ceramics, glass, woodcarvings, and luxury articles of rock crystal and ivory, two materials that found their way to the caliphs’ sumptuous treasuries and were exported to the Christian realms of southern Europe.

Little is known about the influence of the Egyptians on Arab dress and vice versa. Still, sources indicate that Egyptian costume remained largely unchanged until the eleventh century reflected by the increasing Arabization and Islamization of Egypt. At the time the Fatimids had established themselves and created a magnificent dynasty.

A few sources survive to tell us about dress in Egypt under the Fatimids, and between the textual and material evidence available, we can formulate an idea of how the famously lavish Fatimid court, and by extension, the Egyptian population dressed. Once the Fatimids had established their capital in Cairo, however, following the conquest of Egypt under al-Mu’izz (r. 953-975), it seems a court style developed that was more refined and lavish than that of earlier times.

While the great Fatimid palaces in Cairo have disappeared, there is quite a wealth of representations of courtly activity in the form of luxury works of art of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Indeed, the Fatimid dynasty is by far the most prolific in terms of artistic and textual sources regarding Islamic medieval dress amongst the Arabic-speaking caliphates that ruled the Middle East.

The Fatimids were the second Islamic dynasty after the Abbasids that had a taste for the refined splendor and ceremonial airs manifested in their display of attire. They took white and green as their dynastic color in opposition to the Abbasid black. The Fatimids’ usage of white and green had religious and political overtones as a way to advocate the legitimacy of their caliphate. Historians argue that they took green because it connotes the glad tidings given to the believers of the luscious greens in the heavens and the garments made of extravagant green silks (Sundus and Istabraq) mentioned in the Quran, whereas white symbolizes cleanliness and purity. 

When Jawhar al-Ṣiqillī, a Fatimid general who acted as viceroy of Egypt after the Fatimids took it in place of the 4th Fatimid Imam-Caliph Al-Mu’izz li-Din Allah (r. 953-975) until he arrived in 973 C.E, forced the Khutaba (Muslim sermon orators) to take off black garments and don white garments. When Al-Mu’izz eventually arrived in Egypt, he appeared before his subjects wearing a green thawb (overtunic). Fatimid caliphs of Cairo wore white ceremonial robes sometimes decorated with gold and silver embroidery, reflecting the official imagery of luminous splendor and divine light. The bulk of historical records regarding the Fatimid caliphate derived mainly from the Egyptian historian Al-Maqrizi (d. 1442) and Ibn al-Ṭuwayr (d. 1220) who lived much later than the Fatimid period.

In addition to the literary and artistic sources and the relics of surviving fabrics and garments, there is a unique documentary source for the costume history of the Fatimid, Ayyubid, and—to a lesser extent—the Mamluk periods; namely the papers and papyri of the so-called Cairo Geniza. These manuscripts discovered a century ago, which totaled some 200,000 items, consisted of discarded books and documents that had been deposited since the Middle Ages mainly in the storeroom of a synagogue in Fustat (the old name of Cairo) and also in the cemetery of Basatin. 

Of particular importance for our knowledge of clothing in this period are some 750 trousseau lists appended to Jewish marriage contracts (ketubbah) from the Geniza. In combination with ancillary Geniza records, these trousseau lists offer a wealth of information on the attire of Jewish women in medieval Egypt, and by extension, the attire of Muslim women as well. Information for male costumes comes from commercial documents but is not as extensive or detailed. 

One fact stands out clearly from the evidence of the Geniza documents, and that is that Jewish and Muslim women dressed alike during the Fatimid period and the greater part of the Ayyubid period that followed. Jewish women like their Muslim counterparts (and most likely Christians as well) went out veiled in public. One letter in the Geniza written by a Muslim protesting to another about dhimmi women dressing in the same manner as Muslim women goes like this:

 “When they [dhimmi] step outside their homes and walk the streets, they are hardly identified, they can be seated in a higher position than their Muslim peer in the Hammam, and one of them can enter a shop and be seated and be greeted by sellers with respect because of their luxurious clothes unbeknownst of the fact they’re dhimmis.” 

Muhammad ibn Ahmad Ibn Jubayr visited Sicily in the 1180s, nine years after the Fatimid dynasty collapsed (which used to control Scilly up until 1091), and wrote that Christian women in the capital city of Palermo followed Islamic fashions even at Christmas time:

 “they went out clad in gold-colored silk gowns, wrapped in elegant mantles, covered with colored veils, with gilded brodequins on their feet; they flaunt[ed] themselves in church in perfectly Muslim toilettes.”

A) Undergarments in the Fatimid period

The undergarments worn by Fatimid Muslims were a continuation of the same undergarments worn in previous Islamic eras with slight differences in terms of textile decorations, patterns, motifs, and colors matching with Fatimid dynastic color and style.

The ghilāla (chemise), qamiṣ (undershirt), sirwāl (drawers), and izār (waistwrap) were the main undergarments for both sexes amongst all social classes, with differences in the quality of materials depending on wealth and social status. 

Our knowledge of female undergarments in the Fatimid era amount to no more than a couple sources of archeological artifacts dating to the period (like ceramic plates, lustre bowels, wood, and ivory plaques) and a few historical accounts by contemporary historians, in addition to a small number of undergarments mentioned in the records of the Geniza documents.

Men’s undergarments in the fatimid period:

1- Fuṭa

A large sari-like loincloth imported from India. Naser Khosrow, a Persian Ismaili scholar, mentions that Al-Mustanṣir bi-llāh (r. 1036 – 1094) wore a white qamis tucked inside a white Fuṭa. This garment was another influence brought over to Egypt from the Arab West (Maghreb) during the dynasty’s establishing days. It was usually stripped and made of colored silk. The Fuṭa (which is a long wrap-skirt) alongside the blusa (a crop-top blouse similar to the Indian choli) is one of the many female traditional attires of modern Tunisia and can be found in Kabyle Algerian and Morrocan costume as well.

Women’s undergarments in the fatimid period:

1- Ghilāla/qamis

Women’s undergarments mentioned in the geniza were subsumed under the item “a bureau” and that “which is in it,” certainly a pre-Islamic scribal usage, since the phrase “and that which is in it” is mostly in Aramaic. Such pieces of intimate clothing, which were worn directly on a woman’s body, were written into the anonymity of the “bureau” or “pieces of clothing.” The ubiquitous body shirt, the qamis, mentioned in the Umayyad and Abbasid periods, is found occasionally in the Geniza. However, it is nowhere mentioned in the trousseau lists. It would seem, therefore, that it was not commonly used–if at all–to designate an article of female attire in the Fatimid and Ayyubid periods.

Only slips, ghilala, of fine, sometimes translucent, linen are regularly listed, when they were high-priced. A bride from Jerusalem of modest circumstances mentioned in the geniza trousseau had two slips worthy enough to be noted.

2- sirwāl

Women’s sirwāl (underpants) in the Fatimid period were either tight and reached just before the ankle or long and wide. Sources say it was so wide that sometimes the legs became exposed when walking and weren’t covered properly under the outer garments to the degree that propelled the government to interfere in its making and prohibited them. 

3- Tikka

Women paid special attention to the accompanying drawstrings (Tikka) for the sirwāl. Women of high economic status wore tikkas made from silk. Ibn Taghribirdi wrote about the never-seen-before opulent trousseaux of a famous bride Asmāʾ bint Khumarawayh, nicknamed Qaṭr An-nada (the drops of dew), the daughter of the Tulunid governor of Egypt Khumarawayh (r. 884-896) besides having clothes of all kinds and fabrics, had one thousand jeweled tikkas, one, in particular, was decorated with four gold pieces.