«Тахиййат»: Сборник статей в честь Н. Н. Дьякова

m 30 n Herman Bell and Ré Phillips Wadi Halfa: Bride of the Nile 1 This article is dedicated to Professor Nikolay N. Dyakov for the service he has rendered to the memory of Shaikh Muhammad at-Tantawi 2 . Shaikh at- Tantawi of Al-Azhar University came originally from the Delta of the river Nile. In 1840 he was welcomed to St. Petersburg State University and appointed to a professorship. His career in St. Petersburg was not adequately known in his own home country 3 . The article below acknowledges the importance of bio- graphical accounts such as this. T he principal aim is to examine the revival of the town of Wadi Halfa as an international centre for activities in Nubian art, music, language and cul- ture. It is located by the river Nile in Sudan just south of the Egyptian border. Particular attention is given to the First Nubian Cultural and Tourism Festival sponsored by the DAL Group in late autumn of 2012 in Wadi Halfa and Khar- toum. The festival was enriched by the prolific musical legacy of the late al- Ustadh Mohamed Wardi (July 1932 — February 2012) 4 , even though he had died nine months earlier. 1 Many thanks to the Sudanese National Academy of Sciences (SNAS) for inviting us to write an article entitled “A Vision of Wadi Halfa” for their Newsletter of April 2013 and for permitting us to make full use of that article in honour of Professor Nikolay N. Dyakov. 2 Dyakov, ed. (2010). 3 Dyakov (2012). P. 205–211. 4 Wardi is the Arabised form of the original Nubian name Werdíi. His name is spelled Mo- hamed (or Mohammed) Wardi, rather than Muhammad Wardi, in order to facilitate internet access, since the former versions appear more frequently.