Sufis in the Mevlevi order at certain points in history are known to have exercised great authority over royalty.

The Mevlevi Order is better known in the West as the "whirling dervishes".

With that the practice of Sama and the dervishes of the Mevlevi order were born.

It was also the dervish lodge (tekke) of the Mevlevi order, better known as the whirling dervishes.

It is also the instrument of choice of different Sufi orders, particularly the Mevlevi order in Turkey.

Mustafa Kemal met with members of the Mevlevi Order in 1923 before its institutional expression became illegal.

In 1954, the Turkish government granted the Mevlevi order a special permission to perform ritual whirling practices for tourists during two weeks each year.

He became a follower of the saint and swore an oath to follow the Sufi Mevlevi Order.

The Mevlevi Order was outlawed in Turkey in September of 1925 by the new ruling regime of the time.

During his retirement, he became a member of Mevlevi Order gaining the title Mevlevi or Sofu.

The whirling dance that is associated with dervishes is best known in the West by the performances of the Mevlevi order in Turkey.

The master of ceremonies was Shaikh Kabir Helminski, American representative of the Mevlevi order.

The origin of Sama is credited to Rumi, Sufi master and in whose name the Mevlevi Order was founded.

His lineage from his mother goes back to Sayiddina Jalaluddin Rumi, founder of the Mevlevi Order.

Followers of the Mevlevi Order or whirling dervishes are a religious sufi sect unique to Turkey but well-known outside of its boundaries.

In 1976, he was made a sheikh in the Mevlevi order by Suleiman Dede, and moved to Boulder, Colorado, where he started a small centre.

Around this time, Hampartsoum Limondjian started attending mevlevihanes, places of gathering for dervishes of the Mevlevi order, to learn Ottoman music.

As the ritual dance begins, the dervish dons a felt cap, a sikke, in addition to a turban wrapped around the head, a trademark of the Mevlevi order.

In 1228 he invited Bahaeddin Veled and his son Rumi, the founder of the Mevlevi order, to settle in Konya.

Amcazade Koprulu Huseyin Pasha was close to ordinary Ottoman Moslem subjects being a member of the Mevlevi Order.

Other visitors were Suleiman Dede, head of the Mevlevi order in Konya, as well as his disciple Reshad Feild.

And Oliver Stone is developing a feature film on the life of the 13th-century Sufi mystic, who founded the Mevlevi Order of Whirling Dervishes.

In December 1971, he and a group of students went to Konya, Turkey, to meet Bulent and the sema of the Mevlevi order of Dervishes.

Mihrişah Valide Sultan and her son Selim III were both members of the Mevlevi Order, which practiced Sufi whirling.

It also serves as the penultimate piece of the Mevlevi ayini, ritual music of the Mevlevi order, under the name son peşrev (final peşrev), preceding son semai.

The book is about the whirling dervishes and the ceremonies with which they are involved.

Before they're done, they become giant whirling dervishes of destruction.

They include the whirling dervishes who use dance as a means of worship.

We are treated to the amazing sight of around 50 whirling dervishes.

Then they brought in whirling dervishes, which we decided were not modern dance either."

It was from these ideas that the practice of whirling Dervishes developed into a ritual form.

These creatures weren't children - they were whirling dervishes!

They created the whirling dervishes -- the dance to seek God.

Under Ottoman rule it became a tekke and was used by whirling dervishes.

One compelling event promises to be an open-air program by whirling dervishes from Turkey.

Like the religiously inspired whirling dervishes, she seems to be possessed by something beyond herself."

Swept up in small gusts, the sand rose and twisted' like whirling dervishes.

The musicians' platform faces the sheikh; the whirling dervishes take their places to his left.

Such whirling dervishes prompt the strongest denials and feelings of disbelief.

A Government-sponsored company of whirling dervishes from Egypt has also arrived.

In 1974, the Whirling Dervishes were permitted to travel to the West for the first time.

Among the most aesthetically controversial of such programs are those that whirling dervishes have offered in New York over the years.

Here were the whirling dervishes of Turkey, with white robes circling their bodies like smooth ponds.

The Mevlevi Order is better known in the West as the "whirling dervishes".

Improved climate models should help better understand the whirling dervishes of Mars, at least until future missions can obtain more direct measurements.

Everything comes here, from Sudanese whirling dervishes to Chinese hard-rock bands.

Every corporate boss now understands that he's supposed to turn the wage slaves who report to him into whirling dervishes of innovation.

The traffic was bumper to bumper, with yellow cabs whirling dervishes in the dark.

Or whirling dervishes, exhausting themselves for enlightenment.