A madafa (مضافة) is a guest hall: the word comes from dayf, guest, and means a place of hosting. In Jordanian and Palestinian homes its seating is the jalsa arabiya, a set of floor mattresses, wall backrests and armrests that also serves as guest beds. Sofhu makes this seating as a low Arabic floor sofa, and a raised Arabic majlis for formal rooms, to your wall measurements with 32 kg/m³ foam and free worldwide shipping.
- Native name
- مضافة (madafa, also madafah, mudafa; pl. madafat)
- Meaning
- Place of hosting, from dayf, guest
- Seating
- Jalsa arabiya: mattress, backrest, armrest
- Arabic part names
- فرشة farsha, مسند masnad, مركى marka
- Second use
- Seat mattresses double as beds for visiting family
- Sofhu sets
- Single row, L or U, cut to your wall lengths
- Filling
- 32 kg/m³ (32 DNS) high-density foam, no springs
On this page
The word comes first. Madafa (مضافة) is built on dayf, guest, and it means the place where guests are hosted. In Jordan it stands for hospitality without conditions, and in Palestinian and Jordanian towns it names the hall or room a family keeps ready for visitors. If you grew up with one, you already know what it is for. This page is about how to seat one.
The furniture of a madafa is the jalsa arabiya, also called farsha arabiya or qa’da arabiya: mattresses on the floor, cushions against the wall, armrests between the sitters. People also search for it as a Jordanian majlis or a Palestinian diwan. The words differ; the seating is one family.
Sofhu makes it in two forms. The Arabic floor sofa is the low set of floor mattresses and loose cushions described on this page. The Arabic majlis is the raised form: a fully upholstered base with a fixed back and arm bolsters, for the formal guest room. Both appear in the photographs here, each under its own name.
What the madafa is for
A madafa is a room given over to receiving people. Heritage properties and visitor centres in Jordan and the Galilee that take the name put the coffee ceremony at the centre of what they show, because serving coffee is the core act of hosting.
Beyond that, we are careful. Much is written about the madafa as a hall owned by an extended family, with its own customs for seating and for settling disagreements. We have not been able to check those accounts against a solid source, so we leave the detail to the families who keep the tradition. What matters for planning is plain enough: the room must seat many people at once, facing each other, with space in the middle to serve.
That public, shared character sets it apart from a private sitting room and links it to the Syrian and Levantine madafa further north and to the Iraqi mudhif, whose name has the same root. See the Iraqi diwaniya and mudhif page for that hall.
The shigg: the guest side of the tent
The oldest form of the Jordanian guest space is not a room. In a Bedouin tent, the side where the men of the household receive visitors is the shigg. Guests are welcomed there, coffee is made there, and the family’s private side lies behind a divider.
The shigg helps explain why floor seating in this region is light and movable. In a tent, everything has to be rolled, stacked and carried. The seating of a madafa in a stone or concrete house is still a set of separate pieces that can be lifted, aired and rearranged. Our Bedouin majlis page covers the tent tradition and its weaving.
How a jalsa arabiya is put together
The clearest evidence for what people in Jordan actually buy is what is advertised for sale. Sets are sold as kits with three parts.
| Part | Arabic | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Seat mattress | فرشة, farsha | Lies on the floor along the wall; the piece you sit and sleep on |
| Backrest | مسند, masnad | Leans on the wall behind the sitter |
| Armrest | مركى, marka | Sits on the mattress between two people, or closes the end of a run |
One listing for a small room, about 3.5 by 3.2 metres, combined four mattresses with six backrests and four armrests. That is one seller’s kit, not a standard, but it shows the proportions: more backrests than mattresses, and an armrest for roughly every mattress.
A Sofhu floor sofa uses the same three parts. The difference is that we do not sell a fixed kit. As the manufacturer, we cut the seat runs to the length of your walls and then count the backrests and armrests to suit. Our guide to how many backrests and armrests you need explains the arithmetic, and parts of a majlis set names every piece.
Mattresses that become guest beds
Madafa seating has a second job. When relatives come from another city or another country, the seat mattresses are their beds. This is the practical reason the tradition favours straight, modular mattresses over shaped sofas.
If your set will be slept on, plan for it:
- Ask for long, unbroken seat runs on at least one wall.
- Keep armrests loose so they can be lifted away at night.
- Choose a foam feel that suits both uses. Sofhu fills its seats with 32 kg/m³ (32 DNS) high-density polyurethane foam, with no springs, and on a custom order you can ask for a softer or firmer version. Density is the weight of the foam per cubic metre, and denser foam generally keeps its height and support longer than light foam.
- Pick covers you are happy to wash. Ours are zippered, come with their foam inserts and can be machine washed at 30°C.
The taupe kilim floor sofa above shows the idea: three straight runs around the room, armrest blocks marking the places, and loose back cushions that lift away at night.
Floor level or a higher base
Floor-level mattresses are the form closest to the tent and to the kits sold in Jordan. They keep the room open, they are easy for children, and they turn into beds without effort.
A raised Arabic majlis is the better choice where the room is mainly for formal visits and older guests, who will find it easier to sit down and stand up. The burgundy L at the top of this page is a majlis of this kind, with cream stripes and gold-printed panels.
The low side view above, of a dusty blue set, shows how much seat stands above the base on this kind of build. We do not publish heights because every set is made to order. Tell us who uses the room and we will recommend a seat thickness with your quote.
Colour and pattern: what we will not claim
This region is often associated with red and black woven stripes and with the cross-stitch motifs of Palestinian embroidery. We respect both too much to put those names on machine-made cloth. Sofhu does not sell tatreez, and we do not describe any of our fabrics as Bedouin, Jordanian or Palestinian.
What we can do is match a mood. Burgundy and deep red velvets, black with cream, olive and ivory, and teal are all in the gallery on this page. If your madafa already has embroidered cushions or a woven rug that carries family meaning, a plain seat fabric lets those pieces be seen. Loose floor cushions can be added for extra places.
Not every guest room wants deep colour. The grey and navy single seat above, with round bolster arms and a quilted base, is the kind of set that suits a modern apartment where the Arabic seating shares the room with other furniture.
Palestinian and Jordanian homes abroad
Chicago and its suburbs, Bridgeview among them, form the largest centre of Palestinian life in the United States, followed by New York and northern New Jersey, with communities in Houston, Philadelphia, Detroit and Los Angeles as well. Palestinian and Jordanian communities are also present in Canada.
In an American house the natural place for a madafa is the basement or a spare ground-floor room, where a full U can run around the walls. In an apartment, an L in the living room does the work. Because the pieces are made to your measurements, a room with a fireplace, a bay window or a door in an awkward place can still be seated wall to wall. There is a Sofhu page for Arabic sofas in Illinois, and the general ranges are on the Arabic floor sofa and Arabic jalsa pages.
Planning your order
Sofhu builds each set in Türkiye, vacuum packs it and ships it free worldwide. There are no local shops; the set comes to your door. Duties or taxes may apply depending on the destination, so ask us before you order.
To get a quote, send:
- The length of each wall that will carry seating.
- The positions of doors, windows, radiators and sockets on those walls.
- A photo of the room.
- Whether the set will be slept on, and whether you want a floor sofa or a raised majlis.
- The colours you have in mind.
Use get a quote by measurement or WhatsApp. If you are unsure whether to call it a jalsa or a majlis, the jalsa majlis page explains why both names lead to the same furniture.
