Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A band or series of cords used to hold a keffiyeh in place on the head.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun cord that is fastened around the kaffiyeh

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a cord (usually of goat's hair) that Arabs (especially Bedouins) wind around their heads to hold down the kaffiyeh

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Colloquial Arabic , from Arabic ‘iqāl, cord for hobbling a camel, agal, from ‘aqala, to confine, hobble; see עql in Semitic roots.]

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Examples

  • Authors differ much as to the materials of which it is composed: some suppose it to consist of sea-worms, of the mollusca kind; others, of a kind of cuttle-fish, or a glutinous sea-plast called agal-agal.

    Domestic Pleasures, or, the Happy Fire-side Frances Bowyer Vaux

  • He wears a long, white cotton thobe, bleached and pressed to a dazzling crispness, and a red-checked ghutra headdress held in place by the black agal headband, the wool cord once used by the Bedouins to hobble their camels.

    Richard Bangs: Bahrain: Once Was Paradise Richard Bangs 2011

  • He wears a long, white cotton thobe, bleached and pressed to a dazzling crispness, and a red-checked ghutra headdress held in place by the black agal headband, the wool cord once used by the Bedouins to hobble their camels.

    Richard Bangs: Bahrain: Once Was Paradise Richard Bangs 2011

  • He wears a long, white cotton thobe, bleached and pressed to a dazzling crispness, and a red-checked ghutra headdress held in place by the black agal headband, the wool cord once used by the Bedouins to hobble their camels.

    Richard Bangs: Bahrain: Once Was Paradise Richard Bangs 2011

  • Arafat would wear his keffiyeh in semi-traditional manner, around the head and wrapped by an agal, but he also wore a similarly patterened piece of cloth in the neckline of his military fatigues.

    Archive 2008-01-01 Not a sheep 2008

  • Calling him a "Foreigner or AyyRab Lover," they are screeching out domino and post ad hoc conclusions hoping that he will put on a thobe, tagiyah, ghutra, and agal (Arab male garb) to prove their point.

    Yvonne R. Davis: So What If Obama Bowed? HALAS! 2009

  • This item, as it was worn by Yasser Arafat, was typically held in place by a circular rope or agal.

    Stop wearing the Keffiyeh..... GayandRight 2009

  • My Joseph got to be - Joseph, and emerged wearing two towels on his head, one twisted and tied like an agal.

    Dove's Eye View: 2007

  • My Joseph got to be - Joseph, and emerged wearing two towels on his head, one twisted and tied like an agal.

    Merry Christmas to all 2007

  • His gutra (not from Dunhill) was tucked in manifold gatherings under the agal, or headband.

    The Backside of War P. J. O'Rourke 2003

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  • "A gilded agal held the veil of his kaffiyeh in place; silk flowed long and light around a fresh white woolen robe."

    Mistress of the Art of Death by Ariana Franklin, p 190 of the Berkley paperback edition

    February 27, 2012