In the social conflict between the Arab and Berber races, the curious spectacle is presented of two nearly equal elements (same origin, same religion, same government, same or analogous tribal groupings, at about the same cultural development) refusing to amalgamate to any great extent, although living in the closest proximity for over a thousand years. In this struggle the Arab seems so far to have had the advantage. Instances of Berberised Arabs occur, but are extremely rare, whereas the Berbers have not only everywhere accepted the Koran, but whole tribes have become assimilated in speech, costume, and usages to the Semitic intruders. It might therefore seem as if the Arab must ultimately prevail. But we are assured by the French observers that in Algeria and Tunisia appearances are fallacious, however the case may stand in Morocco and the Sahara. "The Arab," writes Malbot, to whom I am indebted for some of these details, "an alien in Mauretania, transported to a soil which does not always suit him, so far from thriving tends to disappear, whereas the Berber, especially under the shield of France, becomes more and more aggressive, and yearly increases in numbers. At present he forms at least three-fifths of the population in Algeria, and in Morocco the proportion is greater. He is the race of the future as of the past[1109]."
This however would seem to apply only to the races, not to their languages, for we are elsewhere told that Arabic is encroaching steadily on the somewhat ruder Berber dialects[1110]. Considering the enormous space over which they are diffused, and the thousands of years that some of the groups have ceased to be in contact, these dialects show remarkably slight divergence from the long extinct speech from which all have sprung. Whatever it be called—Kabyle, Zenatia, Shawia, Tamashek, Shluh—the Berber language is still essentially one, and the likeness between the forms current in Morocco, Algeria, the Sahara, and the remote Siwah Oasis on the confines of Egypt, is much closer, for instance, than between Norse and English in the sub-Aryan Teutonic group[1111].
The Tibus.
But when we cross the conventional frontier between the contiguous Tuareg and Tibu domains in the central Sahara the divergence is so great that philologists are still doubtful whether the two languages are even remotely or are at all connected. Ever since the abandonment of the generalisation of Lepsius that Hamitic and Negro were the sole stock languages, the complexity of African linguistic problems has been growing more and more apparent, and Tibu is only one among many puzzles, concerning which there is great discordance of opinion even among the most recent and competent authorities[1112].
The Tibu themselves, apparently direct descendants of the ancient Garamantes, have their primeval home in the Tibesti range, i.e. the "Rocky Mountains," whence they take their name[1113]. There are two distinct sections, the Northern Tedas, a name recalling the Tedamansii, a branch of the Garamantes located by Ptolemy somewhere between Tripolitana and Phazania (Fezzan), and the Southern Dazas, through whom the Tibu merge gradually in the negroid populations of central Sudan. This intermingling with the blacks dates from remote times, whence Ptolemy's remark that the Garamantes seemed rather more "Ethiopians" than Libyans[1114]. But there can be no doubt that the full-blood Tibu, as represented by the northern section, are mainly Mediterranean, and although the type of the men is somewhat coarser than that of their Tuareg neighbours, that of the women is almost the finest in Africa. "Their women are charming while still in the bloom of youth, unrivalled amongst their sisters of North Africa for their physical beauty; pliant and graceful figures[1115]."
It is interesting to notice amongst these somewhat secluded Saharan nomads the slow growth of culture, and the curious survival of usages which have their explanation in primitive social conditions. "The Tibu is always distrustful; hence, meeting a fellow-countryman in the desert he is careful not to draw near without due precaution. At sight of each other both generally stop suddenly; then crouching and throwing the litham over the lower part of the face in Tuareg fashion, they grasp the inseparable spear in their right and the shanger-mangor, or bill-hook, in their left. After these preliminaries they begin to interchange compliments, inquiring after each other's health and family connections, receiving every answer with expressions of thanksgiving to Allah. These formalities usually last some minutes[1116]." Obviously all this means nothing more than a doffing of the hat or a shake-hands amongst more advanced peoples; but it points to times when every stranger was a hostis, who later became the hospes (host, guest).
The Egyptian Hamites.
It will be noticed that the Tibu domain, with the now absolutely impassable Libyan desert[1117], almost completely separates the Mediterranean branch from the Hamites proper. Continuity, however, is accorded, both on the north along the shores of the Mediterranean to the Nile Delta (Lower Egypt), and on the south through Darfur and Kordofan to the White Nile, and thence down the main stream to Upper Egypt, and through Abyssinia, Galla and Somali lands to the Indian Ocean. Between the Nile and the east coast the domain of the Hamites stretches from the equator northwards to Egypt and the Mediterranean.
It appears therefore that Egypt, occupied for many thousands of years by an admittedly Hamitic people, might have been reached either from the west by the Mediterranean route, or down the Nile, or, lastly, it maybe suggested that the Hamites were specialised in the Nile valley itself. The point is not easy to decide, because, when appeal is made to the evidence of the Stone Ages, we find nothing to choose between such widely separated regions as Somaliland, Upper Egypt, and Mauretania, all of which have yielded superabundant proofs of the presence of man for incalculable ages, estimated by some palethnologists at several hundred thousand years. In Egypt the palaeoliths indicate not only extreme antiquity, but also that the course of civilisation was uninterrupted by any such crises as have afforded means of chronological classification in Western Europe. The differences in technique are local and geographical, not historic. The Neolithic period tells the same tale, and the use of copper at the beginning of the historic period only slowly replaced the flint industry, which continued during the earlier dynasties down to the period of the Middle Empire and attained a degree of perfection nowhere surpassed. Prehistoric pottery strengthens the evidence of a slow, gradual development, the newer forms nowhere jostling out the old, but co-existing side by side[1118].
Origins.