Ḥulwān

▪ ancient city, Egypt

also spelled  Helwan , or  Hilwan 

      ancient settlement, now part of the Ḥulwān muḥāfaẓah (governorate), Egypt. It lies near the right (east) bank of the Nile River. After Egypt gained independence in 1952, it grew into an industrial suburb linked to Cairo by highway and electric railway.

      Ḥulwān was a centre of prehistoric and pharaonic settlement. Although not continuously occupied, its position on a bluff 100–190 feet (30–58 m) above the Nile's low-water line rendered it safe from the annual summer flooding. It was known from early times for its mineral springs. According to Arabic sources ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Marwān, governor of Egypt, chose Ḥulwān for a settlement when the floods of AD 690 forced him to evacuate Al-Fusṭāṭ (Old Cairo). Ḥulwān later declined, and with the advent of the Mamlūks the desert encroached upon it and filled up its medicinal springs. During the reign of the khedive (viceroy) ʿAbbās I (1849–54), the sulfurous springs were uncovered and used again. In 1869 baths were built at the spring, and remains of Umayyad-period (AD 661–750) baths were uncovered. The present baths date from 1892; after 1900 the centre flourished as a spa.

      Ḥulwān's industrial development began after the overthrow of the Egyptian monarchy in 1952. Beginning with a small iron and steel mill in 1958, rolling mills were added, and further expansion completed by the early 1980s allowed the production of 1,500,000 tons per year. Aluminum, cement, fertilizer, and automotive assembly plants have been established in an industrial park at the base of the Al-Muqaṭṭam Hills, and the Egyptian defense industry has a plant complex there. Other industries include flour milling, food processing, and textile printing and dyeing. In the late 1970s the heavy industries began to convert to natural gas, supplied from the Abū al-Gharādīq gas fields in the Western Desert, through a distribution centre at Dahshūr. The second Suez-Mediterranean oil pipeline passes just south of the city. The former summer residence of King Farouk I, the national observatory (1904), with a 74-inch reflecting telescope, and Ḥulwān (Helwan) University (1975) are in the city. The meteorologic station (1904) was one of the first in Egypt.

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