The fanous, or lantern, is a familiar symbol of Ramadan. Exactly why is not entirely clear, but according to one story it dates to Egypt in the late 10th century CE. According to the story, crowds holding lanterns greeted the arrival of the Fatimad caliph in the new capital, Cairo. Since this was during the month of Ramadan, the tradition, and the association with the holy month, stuck. Beyond the symbolic - the Quran describes God’s light as ”like a niche in which is a lantern’, the fanous was for centuries the primary source of illumination. So it was for this elderly man living in Fujairah and photographed for Al Ittihad, our Arabic sister paper in the mid 1970s. Even then his way of life was already an anachronism, but according to the photographer, he refused to move from what he considered to be his ancestral land even though it meant a 10 kilometre walk every day to collect water. For him also, the simple act of lighting of a lantern also held a deeper meaning.
* James Langton
