Bellydance: what an exotic-sounding word! It conjures up images of desert sheiks and harem girls and camel caravans travelling the Silk Road laden with rare silks, spices, and jewels.

Many people, from bellydancers to ethnologists to historians, have researched the history surrounding this exotic-sounding word and the dance it has come to represent.

One lingering tale about the origin of the term belly dance is more about marketing than about mystery. It has been written that the term was coined by a man named Sol Bloom, an entrepreneur, in order to generate interest in, and ticket sales for, one of the Middle Eastern dance acts he sponsored at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago.

Who this dancer was and where she came from has also been the subject of debate over the years. Some sources indicate she was “Little Egypt” who alternately delighted and embarrassed Victorian-era audiences with her “hoochie-koochie” dancing. Some sources are not entirely sure of her name or which country she came from.

What is certain is the dance was something never seen before by Americans and the term belly-dance has survived. There are more accurate terms, such as raks sharqi or danse du ventre, but I’ll be referring to it as belly dance.

Just what is belly dance or belly dancing? It generally refers to a wide variety of women’s dances originating from eastern Mediterranean (Turkey and Greece) and Middle Eastern countries. This is a dance by and for women, what you could call the mother of all women’s dances!