Hufaidh
Hufaidh is a mythical island in the marshes of southern Iraq, believed to exist by the Madan or Marsh Arabs.
The Madan informants of the traveller Wilfred Thesiger asserted that:
"on it are palaces, and palm trees and gardens of pomegranates, and the buffaloes are bigger than ours. But no one knows exactly where it is... anyone who sees Hufaidh is bewitched, and afterwards no one can understand his words...They say the Jinns can hide the island from anyone who comes near it."[1]
It is, perhaps, analogous to the Irish mythical island of Hy-Brazil. If it ever did exist, the drainage of the marshes under Saddam Hussein would have destroyed it as an island in any case.
- ↑ The Marsh Arabs, Wilfrid Thesiger, Penguin 1967, pp84-85