Berber
Berber or Berbers may refer to:
Ethnic group
* Berbers, an ethnic group native to Northern Africa
* Berber languages, a family of Afro-Asiatic languages
Places
* Berber, Sudan, a town on the Nile
People with the surname
* Ady Berber (1913–196 ...
: ⵎⵏⴾⵍ, ⴰⵎⵏⵓⴽⴰⵍ) is a title for the highest
Tuareg
The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern A ...
traditional chiefs; the paramount confederation leader.
History
Prior to the colonial period in the Maghreb and Sahel, the nomadic Tuareg federations chose a chief from among the wise men of their tribes to rule these confederacies.
*In what is now
Kel Ahaggar
Kel Ahaggar ( Berber: ⴾⵍ ⵂⴴⵔ) (trans: "People of Ahaggar") is a Tuareg confederation inhabiting the Hoggar Mountains (Ahaggar mountains) in Algeria. The confederation is believed to have been founded by the Tuareg matriarch Tin Hinan, w ...
Tuareg confederation since its establishment (circa 1750). It was maintained under colonial French suzerainty since 1903 but no longer recognized after the Algerian independence. It was finally abolished in 1977.
*In the northern mountains of what is now
Niger
)
, official_languages =
, languages_type = National languagesAïr was founded by the Tuareg confederation there, under an ''amenokal'', who was also designated by the Arabic Muslim title
Sultan
Sultan (; ar, سلطان ', ) is a position with several historical meanings. Originally, it was an Arabic abstract noun meaning "strength", "authority", "rulership", derived from the verbal noun ', meaning "authority" or "power". Later, it ...
; hence, it is also called a
Berber
Berber or Berbers may refer to:
Ethnic group
* Berbers, an ethnic group native to Northern Africa
* Berber languages, a family of Afro-Asiatic languages
Places
* Berber, Sudan, a town on the Nile
People with the surname
* Ady Berber (1913–196 ...
sultanate.
According to tradition, the first Tuareg chief was a woman,
Tin Hinan
Tin Hinan was a 4th-century Tuareg queen. What may be her monumental tomb is located in the Sahara, at Abalessa in the Hoggar region of Algeria.
Queen of the Hoggar
Legends
Tin Hinan is sometimes referred to as "Queen of the Hoggar", and by th ...
, the founder of the
Ahaggar
The Hoggar Mountains ( ar, جبال هقار, Berber languages, Berber: ''idurar n Ahaggar'') are a highland region in the central Sahara in southern Algeria, along the Tropic of Cancer. The mountains cover an area of approximately 550,000 km.
...
Abalessa
Abalessa is a town and commune in Tamanrasset Province, in southern Algeria, coextensive with the district of the same name. According to the 2008 census it has a population of 9,163 up from 6,484 in 1998, with an annual growth rate of 3.6%. Abale ...