der·vish

(dûr′vĭsh)

1. A member of any of various Muslim ascetic orders, some of which perform whirling dances and vigorous chanting as acts of ecstatic devotion.

2. One that possesses abundant, often frenzied energy: "[She] is a dervish of unfocused energy, an accident about to happen" (Jane Gross).

[Turkish derviş, mendicant, from Persian darvēš, from Middle Persian driyōš, needy one, one who lives in holy mendicancy, from Old Iranian (Avestan) drigu-; akin to Sanskrit adhriguḥ (a divine epithet of unknown but favorable meaning) : perhaps a-, not + *dhrigu-, poor.]

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

dervish

(ˈdɜːvɪʃ)

(Islam) a member of any of various Muslim orders of ascetics, some of which (whirling dervishes) are noted for a frenzied, ecstatic, whirling dance

[C16: from Turkish: beggar, from Persian darvīsh mendicant monk]

ˈdervish-ˌlike adj

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

der•vish

(ˈdɜr vɪʃ)

n.

a member of any of various Muslim ascetic orders, some of which practice ecstatic dancing and whirling or chanting and shouting.

[1575–85; < Turkish < Persian]

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun

dervish - an ascetic Muslim monk; a member of an order noted for devotional exercises involving bodily movements

fakeer, fakir, faqir, faquir - a Muslim or Hindu mendicant monk who is regarded as a holy man

whirler, whirling dervish - a dervish whose actions include ecstatic dancing and whirling

Translations

dervis

derviş

dervish

[ˈdɜːvɪʃ] N → derviche mf (fig) → salvaje mf

Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

dervish

n → Derwisch m

Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

dervish

[ˈdɜːvɪʃ] n (Rel) → derviscio

Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

Mentioned in

References in classic literature

In order to live a quieter life, the good man put on the robe of a dervish, and divided his house into a quantity of small cells, where he soon established a number of other dervishes.

Of course it was not long before his reputation reached the ears of the man who envied him, and this wicked wretch resolved never to rest till he had in some way worked ill to the dervish whom he hated.

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He kept stumbling over the tail of the Dervish costume in his zeal.

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The really diligent student in one of the crowded hives of Cambridge College is as solitary as a dervish in the desert.

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He felt like the greedy inhabitant of Bagdad when his eyes had been greased with the magic ointment of the dervish, that gave him to see all the treasures of the earth.[2] Caskets of buried jewels, chests of ingots, and barrels of outlandish coins seemed to court him from their concealments, and supplicate him to relieve them from their untimely graves.

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Now there remained no trace of their dominion except the old steamer, once part of a Dervish flotilla, which was his house and office.

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I could enter into the life of the human creatures whom I watched, just as the dervish in the Arabian Nights could pass into any soul or body after pronouncing a certain formula.

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There are stalwart Bedouins of the desert here, and stately Moors proud of a history that goes back to the night of time; and Jews whose fathers fled hither centuries upon centuries ago; and swarthy Riffians from the mountains--born cut-throats--and original, genuine Negroes as black as Moses; and howling dervishes and a hundred breeds of Arabs--all sorts and descriptions of people that are foreign and curious to look upon.

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Besides these Dervishes, were other three who had rushed into another sect, which mended matters with a jargon about "the Centre of Truth:" holding that Man had got out of the Centre of Truth--which did not need much demonstration--but had not got out of the Circumference, and that he was to be kept from flying out of the Circumference, and was even to be shoved back into the Centre, by fasting and seeing of spirits.

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"Shall we sway backward and forward, Mary, as if we were dervishes?"

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Osman had a humanity so broad and deep that although his speech was so bold and free with the Koran as to disgust all the dervishes, yet was there never a poor outcast, eccentric, or insane man, some fool who had cut off his beard, or who had been mutilated under a vow, or had a pet madness in his brain, but fled at once to him; that great heart lay there so sunny and hospitable in the centre of the country, that it seemed as if the instinct of all sufferers drew them to his side.

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